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Executive Summary

Security threats intensified across Europe and Eurasia over the past month. In the Black Sea, drone attacks have sunk at least five merchant vessels in Bulgarian and Romanian waters since October 5, most recently the Contship Jet off Bulgaria on October 28. Romanian President Nicușor Dan blamed Russia, and Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey agreed to share early warning while NATO deployed maritime surveillance assets. In Ukraine, a Russian strike on a school in Zaporizhzhia region killed at least 33 people on November 2, and overnight on November 2-3 Russia launched the largest attack on the energy system this year. Ukraine continued drone strikes on refineries in Samara region, Ufa and Kstovo. In Poland, police in the Kaliningrad border regions went on full readiness from November 2 to 8 after allied sabotage warnings, and Prime Minister Donald Tusk said a provocation near Sępopol had been prevented. Romanian intelligence linked a Russian-coordinated network to a September arson attack in Brașov, and Germany’s military raised its sabotage threat assessment to the second-highest level. In the United Kingdom, two men were charged on October 27 over the Iranian-linked RAF Fairford incident.

Across the region, governments face mounting political, economic and social pressures. In Serbia, the Student List won 53.01% in the October 25 parliamentary election, ending Aleksandar Vučić’s dominance of national politics. In Bulgaria, Iliana Iotova won the November 1 presidential runoff with 57.58%, strengthening Prime Minister Rumen Radev’s camp, which opposes further military aid to Kyiv. In Latvia, Prime Minister Andris Kulbergs was nominated on November 4 to form a new pro-Ukraine coalition. In Poland, the confrontation between the government and President Karol Nawrocki over the Constitutional Tribunal escalated after its president was suspended on October 30. In Albania, opposition lawmakers set off flares in parliament, and protesters threw petrol bombs at police on October 31. In France, about 320,000 people joined cost-of-living protests on October 31, and German engineering-sector warning strikes covering 3.7 million workers began on November 1. Turkish annual inflation rose to 29.77% in October. Armenia ratified the US-backed TRIPP transit framework on October 28, although a peace treaty with Azerbaijan remains outstanding. Meanwhile, US-mediated Ukraine-Russia talks are scheduled for November 10-11 in Abu Dhabi.