Europe

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/1920168

Sir Sadiq Khan has been urged to ban all advertising from fast-fashion giant Shein on Transport for London's (TfL) network, amid concerns over the firm's human rights record.

The retailer, founded in China but now headquartered in Singapore, has been criticised over its environmental impact and working practices, which include allegations of forced labour in supply chains.

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The mayor's office referred the BBC to TfL, which said it would issue a response to London Assembly Green group leader Caroline Russell, who says TfL's acceptance of advertising revenue puts "profits before human rights and dignity".

The assembly member's concerns were raised in the same week that the campaign group Stop Uyghur Genocide launched a judicial review to prevent Shein's Initial Public Offering (IPO) listing on the London Stock Exchange.

"As you will be aware, Shein was one of the companies questioned on labour standards in their supply chain by parliament's business and trade committee in early January," Russell told Sir Sadiq in a letter released on Thursday.

She said Shein representatives failed to answer the committee's question over the use of cotton sourced from China's Xinjiang region "which is notorious for the forced labour of the minority Muslim Uyghur people".

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Mirror: https://archive.is/2025.02.10-050702/https://www.ft.com/content/2bb87769-805a-4270-bab2-2382e0b84cec

Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania have successfully synchronized their electricity grids with the Continental Europe Synchronous Area (CESA) on 09 February 2025 at 14:05 EET, marking a historic milestone in their journey towards strengthened energy system resilience and integration with the Continental Europe electricity grid.

This synchronization enables the Baltic States to manage their electricity grids in close cooperation with all other Continental European countries, with stable and reliable frequency control, significantly enhancing regional energy security. Previously relying on the Russian and Belarussian systems for frequency management, the Baltic states have now joined the synchronous grid of Continental Europe, serving over 400 million customers. All electricity interconnections with Russia and Belarus have been permanently disconnected.

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Here is the original poll in German.

German voters are overwhelmingly concerned about foreign election interference according to a new poll published by the Brussels-based digital industry association Bitkom.

Overall, the poll found that 88% of the more than 1,000 eligible voters surveyed expressed fear that outside forces, whether governments, groups or individuals, would actively attempt to sway the vote through social media campaigns.

Ranked highest among those suspected of nefarious activity was Russia (45%), followed by the US (42%) and China (26%). There was also concern voiced over East European actors (8%).

Those voters polled also provided insight into how they form their political opinions, with 82% citing conversations with friends and family, 76% television and 69% the internet.

Some 80% of respondents felt the next government should address the problem of potential internet and social media misinformation by prioritizing digital policy.

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Paywall? https://archive.is/9hAIw

Here is the original version in German.

English summary (aumotated translation with minimal edits).

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German consumer watchdogs have criticised the EU’s actions against Chinese low-cost suppliers such as Temu and Shein as insufficient. "The proposals are a missed opportunity," Stefanie Gru.ert, expert at Germany's Federal Consumer Association (vzbv) said according to the weekly "Spiegel". "We fear that products on the platforms will become more expensive without making them safer," she adds.

The EU Commission announced plans on Wednesday for tighter controls to ensure safe online trading. The new idea is to introduce a handling fee for parcels from Shein, Temu and Co.

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According to the EU Commission, consumers receive up to twelve million small items, such as toys, every day in the Schengen area, most of them from China. The number has doubled from 2023 to 2024.

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The vzbv calls for platforms to be more responsible, unsafe products should not even be allowed to be sold. Online marketplaces should check new offers with the EU database on dangerous products before they are released for sale.

The German Association for E-Commerce and Mail Order is calling on it to enforce existing rules better.

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Nitazenes were developed in the 1950s by a Swiss chemical company as a new type of painkiller, but the drug was so potent that it was never approved as a medicine. Even trace quantities can cause an overdose.

Decades later, nitazenes have re-emerged in the underground drug market: they have been detected in counterfeit prescription medicines, including fake oxycodone and benzodiazepines pills, and in street drugs, including cocaine, heroin and ketamine.

The UN drugs agency and countries around the world have warned of the major health risks posed by nitazenes. The super-strength opioid has already caused hundreds of deaths in Europe, the UK and North America.

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In April 2019, Estonia became the first country in Europe to identify isotonitazene in drug seizures. New types of the drug followed and, over the years, Estonia recorded a rise in the proportion of nitazene deaths: half of all drug-related deaths over the past two years were caused by nitazenes, according to the most recent official figures.

Estonia is no stranger to synthetic opioids: it faced one of the first fentanyl epidemics in the world in the early 2000s, lasting nearly two decades and causing almost 1,500 deaths. After Estonian police cracked down on fentanyl labs in 2017, the drugs largely disappeared. But they were soon replaced by an even deadlier substance.

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This investigation has linked a recent Estonian nitazene seizure case to China using publicly available documents. A court verdict from August 2024 shows a man was jailed after ordering two shipments of protonitazene. Postimees was granted permission to inspect court files related to the case, which showed one batch of drugs was ordered from a US phone number listed on a Chinese website which hosts online advertisements offering pharmaceuticals for sale.

Archived versions of the website, which say it is based in Nanjing city, show that it previously advertised three types of nitazenes, including protonitazene. These drugs have a “99 percent purity” level, according to the ads, and are transported in 1kg and 5kg bags or 25kg drums. Archived versions of the site say the pharmaceutical company is focussed on “serving foreign customers” and that its products have been sent to more than 30 countries. The court judgment said the drugs were shipped from a DHL distributor in Germany before arriving in Estonia.

Authorities in Norway have also seized nitazenes originating in China. Seven packages containing the drugs and totalling more than 150g were seized during 2023, according to public records requests to Norwegian Customs. The largest of the packages, 90.4g, was shipped via FedEx to Oslo’s main airport from Hong Kong.

Bellingcat and Postimees have uncovered another link between Chinese-made nitazenes and Europe. One package of yellow powder, which was labeled as “nail paste”, was intercepted in Stockholm in August 2019. The package, which testing showed contained almost 49g of isotonitazene, had been couriered from Shanghai, according to documents obtained through a public request to Swedish customs.

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Three Baltic nations – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – disconnected from Moscow's power grid to join the EU's electricity network in an attempt to decrease their "vulnerability ... to Russian blackmail", FRANCE 24 Chief Foreign Editor Rob Parsons said in an analysis.

In case of paywall use reader mode.

While the rise of populism has been a global phenomenon since 15 years, it has lately found particularly fertile ground in the lands of the former Danubian monarchy, Austria, Slovakia and Czech Republic.