In a late-night Facebook post, Slovak PM Robert Fico said he’ll drop his veto on the EU’s 18th sanctions package against Russia, clearing the way for its approval today.

Welcome to the Capitals by Nicoletta Ionta with Eddy Wax. Sign up here. Feedback is welcome and do forward us to a friend or colleague.

Perched atop the snow-dusted heights of the Zugspitze, Germany’s highest peak, a handpicked group of European interior ministers are gathering today for closed-door talks on one of the EU’s most explosive dossiers: migration.

Against the Alpine backdrop, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt has summoned a coalition of the willing from France, Poland, Austria, Denmark, and Czechia, with EU Home Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner also flying in. The optics are clear: Berlin is getting tough on migration.

“It is a new impetus from the German side,” said one official. Under its previous Social Democrat-led government, Germany was reluctant to tighten the bloc’s asylum framework, particularly during tense negotiations around the Migration and Asylum Pact.

The timing is no accident. Brussels is in the midst of recalibrating its migration handbook, with proposals such as the return regulation and safe country classifications steadily reshaping the bloc’s asylum rules. Still, no one’s claiming victory. “Our work is far from over. The Pact on Migration and Asylum was a compromise, which actually responded to the situation in 2015,” Czech Interior Minister Vít Rakušan told The Capitals.

The Zugspitze meeting aims to push for a tougher and more unified EU migration policy. More surveillance, stricter border controls, coordinated repatriations and new cooperation mechanisms with countries of origin and of transit.

EU migration chief Magnus Brunner told The Capitals he’s bringing “very good news from Brussels”, as the new MFF proposal triples migration and security funding.

This won’t be a fight club-style summit, but rather a strategic shift building on recent initiatives, and a fresh push from Berlin after years of hesitation.

“Germany has turned a corner in asylum and migration policy and is no longer perceived as the ghost driver in Europe,” a source close to the German Christian Democrats, Germany's ruling party, said.

A draft of the final declaration points toward a hardened EU stance: faster returns, beefed-up budgets, stricter enforcement against smugglers, and harmonised implementation of common rules. It’s as much about optics as outcomes, a clear attempt to tee up priorities for the EU Commission.

“Reforms must be accelerated along the following lines: reducing the bureaucratic burden - health checks, appeals -, lowering of reception standards for applicants from safe countries and strengthening security elements,” Rakušan said.

With Germany slipping into the driver’s seat, there's a good chance the proposed measures will become reality. Whether that shift will lead to a drop in migration is another matter.

Fico drops his veto

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico dropped his veto on the EU’s 18th sanctions package against Russia late Thursday, clearing the way for adoption. Continuing to block the new sanctions package was counterproductive, he explained in a lengthy video.

Fico said he reached a deal with EU Commission President von der Leyen on guarantees for Slovakia over gas prices, including protection against shortages, high transport fees, and a crisis mechanism that could suspend the Russian gas import ban in emergencies.

Earlier this week, Fico slammed the brakes on the sanctions, citing fears that the new measures would jeopardize Slovakia’s vital gas imports from Russia.

Even though Slovakia will no longer block the package, Fico said a “second stage of the fight over Russian gas” would begin immediately after Friday’s vote.

Bardella lashes out at EU Parliament over funding probe

In an internal email seen by The Capitals, Patriots for Europe leader Jordan Bardella of France slammed what he described as a campaign of “political harassment” by the European Parliament administration over suspected misuse of EU funds by ID members, including Le Pen’s RN.

“We are well aware that this move is part of a campaign of political harassment orchestrated by part of the European Parliament administration,” Bardella wrote, accusing officials of trying “to weaken our group and discredit our work from the very first months of this parliamentary term.”

Euractiv first reported that the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) confirmed it had opened an investigation into the suspected misuse of EU funds.

To assert the group’s legal autonomy, Bardella said a team of lawyers specialising in European and association law has been appointed. “They are actively working to have the complete legal separation between the two structures recognised,” he said, adding that formal talks with the presidency of the European Parliament were ongoing.

Judicial double take

Dolors Montserrat – EPP party heavyweight and Spanish head of delegation of the EPP group in the European Parliament – weighed in on what she sees as a double standard in how the EU responds to rule-of-law concerns, especially when it comes to Spain.

Speaking about the political firestorm surrounding Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez, from the controversial amnesty law for Catalan separatists to alleged interference with judicial independence and corruption accusations against his inner circle, Montserrat didn’t hold back. “Why are these issues ‘European’ in Hungary and not in Spain? I cannot understand,” the Spanish MEP told Euractiv.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez recently ruled out resigning, and unveiled a new anti-corruption strategy. “Corruption is a European issue. Do you think that to attack the independence of the judiciary power is not a European issue?”, she added.

Montserrat drew comparisons with Portugal, where now former Prime Minister António Costa resigned last year amid a corruption scandal: “Why not in Spain?” she added, stressing that political affiliations are irrelevant when the rule of law is at stake. “It doesn’t matter if the Socialist Party is a European party”.

Regional rebellion

The president of the European Committee of the Regions has hit out at the EU’s budget proposal, describing it as a bid by Ursula von der Leyen for total centralisation over cohesion funds.

“There’s only one way to reject the total centralisation: We have to push back,” Kata Tüttő told The Capitals in an exclusive interview. “Part of the funds has always been centralised and yes part can be centralised, but you cannot centralise everything,” the Hungarian socialist said.

Almost half of the €2 trillion new budget will be subsumed in a catch-all fund for regions, farmers and many other recipients. In the current EU budget, cohesion is a standalone programme. The Commission argues that flexibility is needed to “modernise” the budget and that regions will still play a key role – should national governments deem it necessary. “I’m not going to accept the thinking framework,” Tüttő said.

“If you detach the local leaders from the design of the policy and you only consider them as implementers you will lose all the innovation capacity, the creativity, the ambition and a lot of local resources,” she said.

She added that the secrecy surrounding the procedure – in which commissioners only saw the numbers at the very last minute – gave her “strong déjà vu” of her native Hungary.

BERLIN

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has doubled down on his opposition to the European Commission’s proposed €2 trillion budget for 2028–2034, rejecting both increased spending and plans for a joint EU corporate tax. “The EU will now have to make do with the funds it has at its disposal,” Merz said, warning of a tough two-year battle over the bloc’s long-term financial plan.

PARIS

France has completed its military withdrawal from Senegal as part of a broader retreat from Africa, driven by rising anti-French sentiment and a push by former colonies to assert sovereignty. While ties with Paris remain strong, countries like Senegal are turning to new partners such as China to diversify their alliances. Read more.

ROME

The controversial Strait of Messina bridge is ineligible for EU Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) funds, as it no longer meets the scheme's cross-border criteria. But Brussels officials said Thursday that the project remains part of the national segment of the TEN-T network and could still be funded through national sources or the EU’s new Competitiveness Fund.

MADRID

Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez is renewing efforts to make Catalan, Galician, and Basque official EU languages to maintain backing from increasingly unreliable separatist allies. The push comes amid coalition tensions, corruption scandals, and mounting pressure on his narrow majority. Read more.

PRAGUE

Czech President Petr Pavel signed a law criminalising the promotion of communist ideology, placing it on par with Nazi propaganda. The move has drawn backlash from the Communist Party, which called it a political attack ahead of October’s elections. Read more.

BRATISLAVA

The Commission is taking Slovakia to court for failing to guarantee suspects the right to a lawyer before questioning, one of the EU’s core fair trial protections. Read more.

Tobacco tax in EU budget: What if Europe goes smoke-free?

The Commission wants tobacco taxes to fund a fifth of EU-level sources of income, but the proposal casts doubts on the bloc’s goal of a smoke-free generation by 2040.

The majority of the proposed €2 trillion budget still comes from national contributions, but a growing share is expected to come from new EU-wide revenue streams, known as 'own resources'. One of the biggest proposed sources: tobacco. Read more.

Ministers meet to discuss the EU budget proposal at the General Affairs Council, where Spain will make a new push to have Catalan recognised as an EU official language

Informal meeting of internal market and industry ministers in Copenhagen

Zugspitze Migration Summit brings together interior ministers from France, Poland, Austria, Denmark, and Czechia, with EU Home Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner also in attendance

Minutes before a key MFF defence briefing, a bomb drill locked down the Berlaymont. Security told journalists to stay out unless they wanted to be escorted to a bomb shelter. Ironically, the designated bomb shelter was none other than the Salle de Presse, exactly where reporters were trying to go in the first place.

As of today, Nele Eichhorn, former Cabinet member to Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager, will serve as Head of Unit for ‘EU-UK Trade & Cooperation Agreement’.

Contributors: Nick Alipour, Laurent Geslin, Aneta Zachová, Inés Fernández-Pontes, Kjeld Neubert, Alessia Peretti, Natália Silenská, Elisa Braun.

Editors: Matthew Karnitschnig, Sofia Mandilara, Charles Szumski.