Russian Attacks on Europe Double in Lead up to Elections, Olympics | India Just Showed the World How to Fight an Authoritarian on the Rise | Britain’s Revival Must Start with the BBC, and more

The EU has been alarmed at the increased sophistication of disinformation campaigns before elections where 373 million voters are eligible to cast ballots, including 26 million young people voting for the first time.
“Deepfake” techniques to promote sometimes completely false and misleading statements have been detected, including the “Doppelgänger” Russian-based network that has been active across the EU since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Europeans Detail Iran’s Nuclear Violations in Diplomatic Gambit  (Reuters / VOA News)
Three European powers have written to the U.N. Security Council detailing Iran’s violations of its 2015 nuclear deal, a step diplomats said Thursday aimed to pressure Tehran to resolve the issue diplomatically and to avoid reimposing U.N. sanctions.
The British, French and German letter did not explicitly threaten to “snap back” U.N. sanctions, but it noted that Security Council Resolution 2231, which enshrined the nuclear deal and provided that power, expires on October 18, 2025.
In its own letter, Iran rejected the European stance, noting that then-U.S. President Donald Trump reneged on the nuclear deal in 2018 and reimposed U.S. economic sanctions on Iran, arguing they were within their rights to expand their nuclear work.
The effort by Britain, France and Germany, known informally as the E3, to ramp up pressure was also visible this week at the International Atomic Energy Agency, where they successfully pushed a resolution critical of Iran despite U.S. reservations.

The Party That Could Shake Up German Politics  (Jen Kirby, Foreign Policy)
At a rally organized around Germany’s newest political party on May 25, those in the crowd seemed most eager to talk about what was wrong with the country’s other parties. They were disappointed with the current coalition government, led by the center-left Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) alongside the Greens and the liberal Free Democrats. They were nervous about the crises Germany faced under its watch: the struggling economy, Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Others were passing through Stuttgart’s Schlossplatz and simply wanted to hear what this new party, the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), had to say. Once a prominent politician in Germany’s Left Party, or Die Linke, Wagenknecht is a media fixture who has built a public following and a reputation for bucking the political mainstream. She officially broke with the Left Party in January and founded her own.
Now, Wagenknecht is betting that voters who feel abandoned or disillusioned by Germany’s establishment will see a political project created in her image as one that’s created in theirs, too. The European Parliament elections, which run from June 6 to June 9, will be an early test case for the BSW’s influence and its ability to disrupt—and further fragment—Germany’s politics.
Wagenknecht’s party doesn’t fit neatly on Germany’s political spectrum. It embraces an unconventional combination of leftist economics and cultural conservatism, such as more restrictive immigration policies and a distrust of identity politics. “It’s a ‘best of’ of protest—almost populist—narratives that they have taken up,” said Mechthild Roos, a lecturer in comparative politics at the University of Augsburg.

Britain’s Revival Must Start with the BBC  (John Kampfner, Foreign Policy)
There are several causes for Britain’s malaise. The two most recognizable emblems of Britain’s soft power, the royal family and the BBC, are themselves beleaguered. There is little Starmer can do to address the former (though, within months of taking office, Blair persuaded Queen Elizabeth to show a little less stiff upper lip following the death of Princess Diana).
But there is much the prospective incumbent in Downing Street can do to help sort out the national broadcaster. The BBC’s future matters far beyond the island’s shores. It is central to the global battle for hearts and minds, an important tool for liberal democracy to counter the increasingly successful disinformation strategies of Russia and China.
In short, a reinvigorated BBC would also reinvigorate Britain’s reputation in the world. But to achieve that is easier said than done and will require considerable surgery.

India Just Showed the World How to Fight an Authoritarian on the Rise  (Zack Beauchamp, Vox)
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is, by some measures, the most popular leader in the world. Prior to the 2024 election, his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) held an outright majority in the Lok Sabha (India’s Parliament) — one that was widely projected to grow after the vote count. The party regularly boasted that it would win 400 Lok Sabha seats, easily enough to amend India’s constitution along the party’s preferred Hindu nationalist lines.
But when the results were announced on Tuesday, the BJP held just 240 seats. They not only underperformed expectations, they actually lost their parliamentary majority. While Modi will remain prime minister, he will do so at the helm of a coalition government — meaning that he will depend on other parties to stay in office, making it harder to continue his ongoing assault on Indian democracy.
So what happened? Why did Indian voters deal a devastating blow to a prime minister who, by all measures, they mostly seem to like?