France grants asylum to anti-Kremlin couple detained in US immigration crackdown

France has granted safe haven to an anti-Kremlin Russian activist couple, who had been held by the country's ICE agency that is leading US President Donald Trump's crackdown on immigration.


Issued on: 17/02/2026 

RFI

ICE agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, on 4 February, 2026. 

© Getty Images via AFP/John Moore

France issued humanitarian visas to Alexei Ishimov, 31, and his 29-year-old wife Nadezhda to avoid them being deported to Russia from the United States.

Alexei Ishimov arrived in Paris from Seattle on Monday morning, correspondents from the French agency AFP said.

Nadezhda, a former volunteer for the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, was expected to arrive on a separate flight from Miami, also on Monday morning.

But she did not show up at the Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport as planned.

"I am in shock," a visibly distressed Alexei, who had not seen his wife for more than 20 months, told AFP at the airport.

Olga Prokopieva, head of the Paris-based association Russie-Libertés, which has been assisting the young couple, said Nadezhda was not allowed on the flight because she had a temporary travel document called a laissez-passer instead of a passport.

Russie-Libertes and the Russian Antiwar Committee hope that Nadezhda will be allowed to travel to France soon.

The couple left Russia in 2022 as the Kremlin ramped up a crackdown on opponents following the invasion of Ukraine.

The couple eventually flew to Mexico and entered the United States in 2024. They were detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and sent to different detention centres as part of Trump's immigration crackdown.

Alexei had spent nine months in detention in California and later in the state of Washington. In January 2025, he was released with an ankle bracelet.

Nadezhda has been kept at the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center for around 21 months.

To avoid deportation to Russia, Alexei had contacted numerous countries.

"Starting from May 2025, I wrote letters to more than a hundred countries asking for help, and essentially no one responded except France," he said.
Gratitude to France

He said that French diplomats were "constantly in touch."

They "worked very closely with ICE representatives, contacted me regularly, and did everything possible to help us obtain a lawful path to safety and reunification," he said.

"It is hard for me to find the words to express the gratitude we feel," he added.

Tens of thousands of Russians have applied for political asylum in the United States since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Many detainees have been subjected to arbitrary detention and not given a fair chance to defend themselves in court.

About 1,000 Russians, many of them asylum seekers, have been deported back to Russia from the United States since 2022. Some deportees were arrested on arrival.

Dmitry Valuev, head of the Russian America for Democracy in Russia (RADR) group which has followed the couple's case, said that a US judge had ordered that Nadezhda be deported to Russia. But activists hope she'll be allowed to fly to France.

Alexei said he would feel at ease only when he sees his wife.

"We are very tired: it has been almost two years of constant stress and pain, and separation is especially hard when you have no idea when it will end."

(with AFP)

EU investigates Shein over sale of childlike sex dolls

Brussels (Belgium) (AFP) – The EU on Tuesday opened an investigation into the online retail giant Shein over the sale of childlike sex dolls and what it called the platform's "addictive design".

Issued on: 17/02/2026 - RFI

Shein came under greater scrutiny in November after French authorities condemned the giant for featuring sex dolls resembling children.

The probe is the European Commission's first into Shein under the Digital Services Act (DSA), the EU's mammoth law that aims to counter the spread of illegal content and goods online.

The European Commission said it was investigating the sale of illegal products "including child sexual abuse material" and would look at the "lack of transparency" of Shein's recommender systems.

Shein, founded in China in 2012 but now based in Singapore, said it would continue to cooperate with the commission.

"We share the commission's objective of ensuring a safe and trusted online environment and will continue to engage constructively on this procedure," Shein said in a statement.

Following the uproar in France, Shein said it immediately removed the products and banned sex dolls from its site globally regardless of appearance.

Shein is among more than 20 "very large" online platforms that must comply with the DSA or risk fines that could reach as high as six percent of their global turnover, or even a ban for serious and repeated violations.

'Addictive features'

The EU said its investigation would focus on the systems Shein has in place to prevent the sale of illegal products in the 27-country bloc.

The products also include weapons as well as toys, clothing, cosmetics and electronics that are unsafe or not compliant with EU rules.

Regulators said they were also looking into the risks linked to the platform's "addictive design", such as giving consumers points or rewards for engagement.

"Addictive features could have a negative impact on users' wellbeing and consumer protection online," the commission said.

"We have a suspicion Shein underestimated (this) in the risk assessment and also didn't put proportionate measures in place to tackle this particular risk," an EU official said.

Brussels also wants to know details about the algorithms used by platforms to feed users more personalised content.

But the commission said the "opening of formal proceedings does not prejudge its outcome" and there is no deadline for the probe's completion.

Shein can now offer commitments to try to satisfy the EU's concerns.

The company said it had already invested significantly in measures to adhere to the DSA.

There are currently other DSA probes into the Chinese online retailer AliExpress and the social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok.

The EU this month told TikTok it needed to change its "addictive" design.

The EU has faced criticism for the DSA investigations into US tech giants from President Donald Trump's administration, which says it is a tool of "censorship".

© 2026 AFP

Bangladesh's new PM, political heir Tarique Rahman

Dhaka (AFP) – Long overshadowed by his parents and heir to one of Bangladesh's most powerful political dynasties, the country's new Prime Minister Tarique Rahman has finally stepped into the spotlight.


Issued on: 17/02/2026 - RFI

Tarique Rahman's rise marks a remarkable turnaround for a man who only returned home in December after 17 years in exile in Britain 

© MUNIR UZ ZAMAN / AFP

At 60, the leader of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) takes charge of the South Asian nation of 170 million, driven by what he calls an ambition to "do better".

A year and a half after the deadly uprising that toppled previous prime minister Sheikh Hasina's iron-fisted rule, the BNP won a "sweeping victory" in parliamentary elections on February 12.

He was sworn in on Tuesday, leading a more than two-thirds majority in parliament.

"This victory belongs to people who aspire to and have sacrificed for democracy," he said in a speech.

His rise marks a remarkable turnaround for a man who only returned to Bangladesh in December after 17 years in exile in Britain, far from Dhaka's political storms.

Widely known as Tarique Zia, he carries a political name that has shaped every stage of his life.

He was 15 when his father, president Ziaur Rahman, was assassinated in 1981.

Tarique's mother, Khaleda Zia -- a three-time prime minister and a towering figure in Bangladeshi politics for decades -- died aged 80 in December, just days after his return home.

'My country'

Rahman, speaking to AFP just before the vote, vowed to build on their legacy.

"They are them, I am me," he said from his office, beneath gold-framed portraits of his late parents. "I will try to do better than them."

Tarique Rahman, widely known in Bangladesh as Tarique Zia, carries a political name that has shaped every stage of his life 

© Sajjad HUSSAIN / AFP


He described the "mixed feelings" that overwhelmed him when he arrived home in December -- the joy of returning, swiftly eclipsed by grief at his mother's death.

Instead of celebrating, however, he had to bid farewell to his ailing mother, who had long been in intensive care.

"When you come home after so long, any son wants to hug his mother," he said. "I didn't have that chance."

Within days of landing in Dhaka, the still grieving heir assumed leadership of the BNP.
'Unnerves many'

Born when the country was still East Pakistan, he was briefly detained as a child during the 1971 independence war.

His party hails him as "one of the youngest prisoners of war".

Tarique Rahman grew up in his mother's political orbit as she went on to become the country’s first female prime minister

 © Munir UZ ZAMAN / AFP

His father, Ziaur Rahman, an army commander, gained influence months after a 1975 coup when founding leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman -- Sheikh Hasina's father -- was murdered.

It entrenched a rivalry between the two families that would define the country's politics for decades. Ziaur Rahman himself was killed in 1981.

Rahman grew up in his mother's political orbit as she went on to become the country's first female prime minister, alternating power with Hasina in a long and bitter duel.

"In her seats, I used to go and I used to campaign," Rahman said. "So this is how slowly and gradually I started getting involved in the politics."

But his career has also been shadowed by allegations of corruption and abuse of power.

A 2006 US embassy cable said he "inspires few but unnerves many".

Other cables labelled him a "symbol of kleptocratic government and violent politics" and accused him of being "phenomenally corrupt".

Arrested on corruption charges in 2007, Rahman says he was tortured in custody.

He fled to London the following year, where he faced multiple cases in absentia. He denied all charges and dismissed them as politically motivated.

But he also told AFP he offered an apology.

"If there are any mistakes which were unwanted, we are sorry for that," he told AFP.

After Hasina's fall, Rahman was acquitted of the most serious charge against him -- a life sentence handed down in absentia for a 2004 grenade attack on a Hasina rally -- which he had always denied.

Married to a cardiologist and father to a daughter, a lawyer, he led a quiet life in Britain.

That changed with his dramatic return in December, accompanied by his fluffy ginger cat, Zebu, images of which went viral on Bangladeshi social media.

He admits the task ahead is now "immense", rebuilding a country he says was "destroyed" by the former government.

© 2026 AFP

Killing of far-right activist triggers turmoil across French political spectrum

The fatal beating of a 23-year-old far-right sympathiser in Lyon has sparked a blame game between France's left and right political circles, while an investigation is underway to uncover the sequence of events leading up to the young man's death.


Issued on: 16/02/2026 - RFI

The killing of 23-year-old far-right sympathiser Quentin Deranque has become a political lightning rod in France © Sylvain THOMAS / AFP

Alara Koknar


Quentin, a 23-year-old mathematics student linked to the far-right collective Némésis, died after being severely beaten during clashes in the city of Lyon on Thursday evening.

Némésis is known for high-profile actions opposing immigration and feminism, and for staging protests targeting left-wing political figures.

According to the group, Quentin had been "helping provide security" for its members as they demonstrated near the university Sciences Po Lyon, where Rima Hassan, a Member of the European Parliament from the hard-left party France Unbowed, was holding a conference.

Clashes between rival political groups

Police sources say an initial confrontation between far-right and far-left supporters escalated into a violent clash roughly 500 metres from the university. Both groups consisted of about twenty individuals. A video acquired by French television channel TF1 shows several individuals beating a man on the ground.

On social media, Némésis has refered to the incident as a “lynching” of its activists, but prosecutors say they are still working to determine the precise sequence of events.

Quentin was later treated by firefighters for a serious head injury. He was hospitalised in critical condition and later declared brain dead on Friday before passing away on Saturday.

Lyon prosecutor Thierry Dran told reporters at a press conference on Monday afternoon that a criminal investigation into voluntary homicide is being conducted by the Lyon police department.

Quentin’s family lawyer has described the attack as a “premeditated ambush”, a claim not yet substantiated by investigators.

'Pray for Quentin': the killing of a 23-year-old far-right sympathiser in the French city of Lyon has triggered protests © ALAIN JOCARD / AFP

Ministers and party leaders trade accusations

Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin said Sunday that “the far-left had clearly killed” the student.

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez also suggested that early evidence pointed to involvement of "far-left activists", mentioning possible links to the Jeune Garde, an anti-fascist group dissolved for its violence in 2025. His claim has yet to be confirmed.

On the right, Marion Maréchal, a far-right member of the European Parliament and niece of Marine Le Pen, accused France Unbowed's of responsibility.

Former interior minister Bruno Retailleau echoed similar claims, expressing that “it is not the police who kill in France, but the far-left”.

French prosecutors stick to demand for five-year ban for Le Pen

Meanwhile, France Unbowed leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon expressed “shock, empathy and compassion” for the family at a rally in Montpellier, while rejecting what he considered “slander”.

“We have nothing to do with this story,” he said, insisting his movement opposes political violence.

UNLIKE IN AMERIKA

Former French culture minister's offices raided in Epstein files fallout

French investigators raided the offices of former Culture Minister Jack Lang, 86, on Monday, as prosecutors step up efforts to examine potential links between French nationals and the crimes of US financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.


Issued on: 16/02/2026 - RFI

Former French Culture minister Jack Lang in Paris on 26 March, 2024

. AFP - STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN

The national financial prosecutor’s office said it had opened a preliminary investigation into alleged aggravated tax fraud and money laundering involving Jack Lang and his daughter Caroline Lang.

Lang resigned earlier this month as president of the Arab World Institute, a position he had held for over a decade, after it was revealed that he had corresponded numerous times with the sexual predator.

Lang had previously requested favours from Jeffrey Epstein, including use of the financier’s car or private plane for himself or family members.The former minister's name also appeared in the statutes of an offshore company founded by Epstein in 2016.

Lang has denied any wrongdoing, saying he was “shocked” to learn of the news. The former minister has insisted that he had known nothing of Epstein’s 2008 conviction of "procuring a girl below the age of 18 for prostitution".

In a recent interview with a French newspaper, he described himself as “white as snow” and denounced what he called a “tsunami of lies.”

Journalists work in front of the Arab World Institute (Institut du Monde Arabe - IMA) as a search is being carried out by French police in connection with an investigation into its former head, ex French Culture Minister Jack Lang, and his ties with the late financier Jeffery Epstein, in Paris, France, 16 February, 2026. © Stephane Mahe / Reuters

Special team of judges

Monday's office raid comes as Paris prosecutors confirmed over the weekend that they are establishing a special team of judges to study material released by US authorities concerning Jeffrey Epstein’s network.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said the new team will work closely with the police and with prosecutors from the national financial crimes unit to determine whether any French citizens had committed crimes.

The aim, according to prosecutors, is to extract any piece of evidence from the Epstein files that could be reused in new investigations.

Members of France's political and cultural elite named in Epstein files

French prosecutors have also announced that they will revisit the case of Jean-Luc Brunel, a former modelling agency executive and close Epstein associate who died in custody in Paris in 2022 after being charged with raping minors. The case against him was dropped in 2023 in the wake of his death.

Prosecutors said Brunel had offered modelling jobs to young girls from disadvantaged backgrounds and had engaged in sexual acts with underage girls in multiple locations including the United States, the US Virgin Islands and France.

Ten women have brought accusations against him, including being subjected to forced sexual penetration.

Jeffrey Epstein died in a US prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. US authorities ruled his death a suicide.

(with newswires)

Ghana seeks formal UN acknowledgement of African slave trade injustice

Ghana will submit a resolution to the United Nations General Assembly in March to designate the African slave trade as "the most serious crime against humanity," Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama announced on Sunday during the African Union Summit in Ethiopia.


Issued on: 16/02/2026 - RFI

John Dramani Mahama, President of the Republic of Ghana, addresses a press conference on the theme 'Ancestral Debt, Modern Justice: Africa's Unified Case for Reparations' during the 39th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union at the AU Headquarters in Addis Ababa, on 15 February, 2026. AFP - MARCO SIMONCELLI

The resolution is to be submitted to the United Nations member states in March, as a "declaration on the trafficking of enslaved Africans and the racialised enslavement of Africans, described as the most serious crime against humanity," said the Ghanaian head of state, whose country was the first on the continent to gain independence in 1957.

"This UN resolution is just the first step," Mahama said at the close of the AU's annual summit in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital.

"We believe that with the consultations we have conducted and the support of the African Union (AU), the truth will finally be recognised: the transatlantic slave trade was the greatest injustice and the greatest crime against humanity."

Transatlantic cruise to turn spotlight on Brazil-Angola slavery past

'Restoring historical truth'

Adopting this resolution is not about erasing history, Mahama insisted but about acknowledging it.

"The trade of enslaved Africans and racialised forms of slavery are foundational crimes that shaped the modern world," he said.

"Their consequences continue to manifest themselves in structural inequalities, racial discrimination, and economic disparities," he continued. "Recognising these injustices is not synonymous with division, but with moral courage. This initiative offers us a historic opportunity. An opportunity to affirm the truth of our history."

He defended his proposal as "an opportunity to acknowledge the greatest injustice in the history of humankind".

"An opportunity to lay the foundations for genuine reconciliation and real equality. While the past cannot be changed, it can be acknowledged. And acknowledgment is the first step toward justice."

Benin to give nationality to descendants of those deported as slaves

Slow process

John Mahama’s predecessor as President of Ghana, Nana Akufo-Addo, called in November 2023 for a united front to obtain reparations for the transatlantic slave trade and the damage caused during the colonial era.

The transatlantic slave trade organised the trafficking of millions of people from West and Central Africa.

For the Ghanaian head of state, who stated that he was speaking in concert with the countries of CARICOM (Caribbean Community), it is “not just about financial compensation, it is about restoring historical truth.”

“But, for now, our goal is to submit the resolution to the [UN] General Assembly, to allow the world to recognise that this happened and that there has been no greater injustice against humanity in recent history or in world history than the slave trade,” the Ghanaian president emphasised.

Cape Coast Fort in Ghana, a former colonial trading post involved in the slave trade, has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979.

Cameroon’s Shrinking Forests

February 17, 2026 
By Africa Defense Forum


Forests cover nearly half of Cameroon, but they are being rapidly degraded by illegal logging operations that feed China’s appetite for tropical lumber.

Cameroon has granted companies from around the world nearly 100 timber concessions to cut and ship logs legally. However, international observers say that many more logging operations occur unofficially, resulting in a loss of millions of dollars in resources and revenue each year.

Cameroonian legislation adopted in 1994 regulates logging through quotas and requires companies to reforest logged areas. Illegal logging is undercutting all of that, according to analysts.

“While observers focus their attention on legal logging, which is the real driving force behind the forestry industry, illegal logging, which is often better organized, undermines national efforts,” researchers Jean Sovon and Vivian Wu recently wrote for Global Voices

Corruption fuels the harvest and export of illegal logs, known locally as warap. In many cases, the illegal exports are made up of logs cut indiscriminately without concern for their age, size or species. The logs are then shipped to markets in China and Vietnam, which receive 70% of Cameroon’s timber exports, according to the government’s Forest Revenue Securing Program.






“Despite numerous efforts by national authorities to control the flow of timber, strong demand from Asian countries, led by China, has opened the door to unorthodox practices,” Sovon and Wu wrote.

Research by Global Forest Watch shows that deforestation in Cameroon rose sharply between 2013 and 2014 and has remained high ever since, averaging about 171,000 hectares a year compared to an average of 41,000 a year the decade before.

A 2023 investigation by Le Monde newspaper and InfoCongo revealed that illegal logging in Cameroon is accelerating. Officials records from each end of the Cameroon-to-China pipeline tell the story.

According to the United Nations Comtrade database, between 2011 and 2014 Cameroon and China consistently reported about a $100 million difference between the value of wood products exported from Cameroon and imported by China. The gap represents the value of smuggled logs.

That gap grew by 50% in 2015, even as Cameroon’s side of the equation remained fairly steady at about $150 million in exports. By 2018, the most recent year for which data is available, the gap had widened by nearly 75%.

In total, the gap between exports and imports represented nearly $900 million in smuggled timber between Cameroon and China.

Le Monde and InfoCongo interviewed a logging truck driver identified as Derek who has been carrying illegal timber from forests to ports for years. Despite the lack of proper markings, the logs pass easily through government checkpoints, Derek told the researchers.

“Every inspector knows you’re coming,” he said.

In 2022, Cameroon launched the second generation of the Forest Information Management System (SIGIF2) designed to block illegal logging and exports. So far, however, the system has lacked the support from other governments to make it effective.

Further complicating matters, porous borders make it difficult for Cameroon to prevent illegal logging and trafficking by groups outside the country.

Cameroon increased its export tax on logs in recent years in hopes of processing logs into lumber and other items for export. Along with its neighbors in the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC), Cameroon plans to suspend overseas timber exports starting in 2028.

Loopholes in the planned ban still could allow logging companies to export by modifying their logs slightly — shaving them from round into square profiles, for example, according to the Center for Action for Development (CAD). Others could get special permits to export, undermining the ban.

In the meantime, logging trucks continue to carry Cameroon’s forests piece by piece to the coast for export to China.

“Logging is like drugs,” Guillaume, a long-time illegal logger, told Le Monde and InfoCongo. “At all times you want to keep consuming.”

Never Forget Bush’s Bait-And-Switch Iraq War – OpEd

February 17, 2026
By James Bovard

A few presidencies ago, Washington politicians used boundless political and intellectual chicanery to drag America into a ruinous war. Thousands of Americans died and scores of thousands of Iraqis perished due to the official myth of Saddam Hussein as the Twentieth Hijacker.

Last November, Axios published new damning information on the role of Saudi government officials in bankrolling the 9/11 attacks on New York City and the Pentagon. Private lawsuits against the Saudi regime “unearthed evidence showing one Saudi official — who acknowledges aiding two men who became hijackers — made a drawing of a plane and a mathematical formula that allegedly could have been used to fly into the World Trade Center.”

That was only the latest stunning revelation in a coverup that will celebrate its 25th birthday this year.

In 2002 and early 2003, the Bush administration rushed to exploit 9/11 to justify invading Iraq. But there was a problem with that con job. A 2002 FBI memo stated that there was “incontrovertible evidence that there is support for these [9/11 hijacker] terrorists within the Saudi Government.” A joint House-Senate congressional investigation found extensive evidence that the Saudi government, not Saddam Hussein, propelled the hijackers. The Bush administration succeeded in suppressing the key 28 pages of that congressional report on the Saudi role on 9/11. Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) became a leading proponent of declassifying those 28 pages, declaring in 2013: “If the 9/11 hijackers had outside help — particularly from one or more foreign governments — the press and the public have a right to know what our government has or has not done to bring justice to all of the perpetrators.”

Those 28 page were finally released (mostly) in 2016, revealing how Saudi government officials directly financed and provided diplomatic cover for several of the hijackers in the U.S. shortly before they unleashed havoc.

Truth delayed is truth defused. Blocking the evidence of the Saudi bankrolling of 9/11 enabled the Bush administration to kill tens of thousands of Iraqis.

The Bush administration sold the Iraq war as payback for 9/11. While false claims by President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney on Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) have received ample coverage, the Bush Saudi-Iraqi Bait-and-Switch has faded into memory.

In a memo Bush sent on March 18, 2003, notifying Congress that he was launching a war against Iraq, Bush declared that he was acting “to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.”

Bush invoked this justification even though his administration had never offered a shred of evidence tying Saddam to 9/11. Bush and team continually threw out new accusations and then backed off, knowing that few people were paying close enough attention to recognize that previous charges had collapsed like a houses of cards.

In the first months after 9/11, there was little mention of Iraq in the public pronouncements by Bush and his top officials. But in his State of the Union address on January 29, 2002, Bush stunned many people by announcing that Iraq, along with Iran and North Korea, were part of an “axis of evil.” Since the war on terrorism had stratospheric support levels in the polls from the American people, the best way to sanctify a war against Iraq was to redefine it as part of the war on terrorism. Bush declared on September 25, 2002: “Al Qaeda hides, Saddam doesn’t, but the danger is, is that they work in concert. The danger is that al Qaeda becomes an extension of Saddam’s madness and his hatred and his capacity to extend weapons of mass destruction around the world. . . . You can’t distinguish between al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror. They’re both equally as bad, and equally as evil, and equally as destructive.”

The next day, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced that the U.S. possessed “bulletproof ” evidence linking Saddam and Al Qaeda. But it was a bullet that could never be exposed to sunlight. An earlier alleged link between Iraqi agents and hijacker Mohamed Atta meeting in Prague had collapsed, with the story disavowed by both the CIA and the Czech government.

On October 7, 2002, Bush, speaking to a selective audience of Republican donors in Cincinnati, laid out his logic: “We know that Iraq and the Al Qaida terrorist network share a common enemy—the United States of America. We know that Iraq and Al Qaida have had high-level contacts that go back a decade… And we know that after September the 11th, Saddam Hussein’s regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.” The fact that some Iraqis cheered the carnage on September 11 proved Saddam could team up with Al Qaeda for a second 9/11.

The link between Saddam and Al Qaeda then took a three-month recess, returning in the 2003 State of the Union address, when Bush declared that “Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of Al Qaeda.” Bush reached for the ultimate hot button: “Imagine those 19 hijackers with other weapons and other plans, this time armed by Saddam Hussein. It would take one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known.”

Three days later, when Bush was directly asked by a journalist at a White House press conference, “Do you believe that there is a link between Saddam Hussein, a direct link, and the men who attacked on September the 11th?” Bush replied: “I can’t make that claim.” Yet, that did not stop him from endlessly making the inference.

But the Bush administration’s new “evidence” failed the laugh test. The Los Angeles Times revealed: “The Bush administration’s renewed assertions of links between Iraq and Al Qaeda are based largely on the murky case of a one-legged Al Qaeda suspect who was treated in Baghdad after being wounded in the war in Afghanistan.” Time noted of Bush’s message on Saddam and Al Qaeda: “If there was no visible evidence to link the two, he just used that fact to argue his point: the danger is everywhere, even if we can’t see it; the threat is growing, even if we can’t prove it. The Administration’s argument for war is based not on the strength of America’s Intelligence but on its weakness.”

In the days after 9/11, when pollsters asked Americans who they thought had carried out the 9/11 attacks, only 3 percent of respondents suggested Iraq or Saddam Hussein as culprits. But by February 2003, 72 percent of Americans believed that Hussein was “personally involved in the September 11 attacks.” Shortly before the March 2003 invasion, almost half of all Americans believed that “most” or “some” of the 9/11 hijackers were Iraqi citizens. Only 17 percent of respondents knew that none of the hijackers were Iraqis. Seventy-three percent believed that Saddam “is currently helping al-Qaeda.”

American soldiers were hit with more concentrated doses of propaganda than private citizens. A 2006 poll of American troops revealed that 85% believed the U.S. mission sought “to retaliate for Saddam’s role in the 9/11 attacks.” That belief likely helped spur some of atrocities against Iraqi civilians by U.S. troops.

U.S. intelligence agencies always knew that the Saddam-9/11 link was a political concoction by pro-war politicians. In July 2004, the Senate Intelligence Committee issued a 511-page report that recognized that the CIA accurately concluded that “to date there was no evidence proving Iraqi complicity or assistance” in the 9/11 attacks. The report noted that the CIA’s accurate judgments on Saddam, Al Qaeda, and the non-link to 9/11 “were widely disseminated [prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq], though an early version of a key CIA assessment was disseminated only to a limited list of Cabinet members and some sub-Cabinet officials in the administration.”

Neither George Bush nor Dick Cheney were ever held liable for their lies that led to carnage in Iraq. Perhaps that is the biggest lesson that Washington policymakers take from the Iraq War.

On the campaign trail in 2015 and 2016, Donald Trump sounded as if he recognized the vast folly of invading Iraq to topple Saddam. But Trump’s promise to “end the endless wars” seems like a hundred years ago. An Associated Press poll last month found that 56% of Americans believed that Trump had already “gone too far” with his military interventions abroad. But will pro-war politicians and political appointees fabricate new pretexts to attack Iran or elsewhere?

An earlier version of this piece was published by the Libertarian Institute.

James Bovard

James Bovard, 2023 Brownstone Fellow, is author and lecturer whose commentary targets examples of waste, failures, corruption, cronyism and abuses of power in government. He is a USA Today columnist and is a frequent contributor to The Hill. He is the author of ten books, including Last Rights: The Death of American Liberty.

Insider Trading And The Wolves Of Capitol Hill – OpEd

February 17, 2026 
By Craig Eyermann

2025 was a good year for the stock market. Americans who invested in a broad market index like the Standard and Poor 500 did really well. But not as well as 29 members of the U.S. Congress who beat the market in 2025.

Beating the market is not easy and beating an index like the S&P 500 in 2025 means getting gains of more than 16.8%. Unusual Whales compiled a report on the members of Congress whose investments beat that return in 2025. I compiled the chart below from the report to focus on the 29 members of Congress whose investment portfolios grew by more than 16.8% last year.


The list is almost evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. There are 15 Democrats and 14 Republicans, indicating a lack of adequate rules governing members of Congress’s trading activities. It’s like an equal-opportunity exercise in insider trading, in which members of Congress have an edge because they know which laws and regulations are in the works that could materially affect their investments.

More than a few members of Congress had trades in 2025 with very questionable timing.

The reigning queen of questionable trading is former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D: CA-11), who has truly made bank throughout her long congressional career. In November 2025, the New York Times reported on her lifetime achievement:




Before first taking Congressional office in 1987, the then-47-year-old freshman and her hubby, venture capitalist Paul Pelosi, reported between $610,000 and $785,000 in stocks in their portfolio, according to a copy of her “hand delivered” 1987 financial disclosure form.

They held a dozen stocks, including CitiBank, and in many companies no longer publicly traded.

That portfolio has soared to $133.7 million today, according to the latest estimates from Quiver Quantitative.

That represents an eye-watering profit of 16,930%—compared to 2,300% for the Dow Jones over those years.

Even with the power of compound interest, the windfall represents a staggering 14.5% average annual return—beating out the S&P 500, NASDAQ and Dow Jones performances over those years, around 7% to 9%.

Most professional money managers are unable to beat the major stock market indices for more than a few years. Repeatedly beating them over decades is a very rare achievement. Or would be without an insider’s edge.

Pelosi has announced she is retiring from Congress at the end of 2026. Will this be the year she really cashes in because it’s her last chance to exploit her inside edge?This article was published by the Independent Institute


Craig Eyermann

Craig Eyermann is a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. He is also the creator of MyGovCost.org: Government Cost Calculator. He received his M.S. in mechanical engineering from New Mexico State University and M.B.A. from the University of Phoenix, having received a B.S. in both mechanical and aerospace engineering from the Missouri University of Science and Technology.

TRUMP CUTS

Radio Free Europe’s Bulgaria, Romania Services To Close

February 17, 2026 
Balkan Insight
By Marian Chiriac

The Bulgarian and Romanian services of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) are set to cease operations on March 31, sources with knowledge of the situation told BIRN, ending two of the most prominent Western-supported journalism initiatives active in the contemporary media environment.

The closures follow the ending of RFE/RL’s Hungarian service on November 21 and are the direct result of the Trump administration’s drive to choke off federal funds for RFE/RL, Voice of America and the other public media outlets supported by the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM).

The Prague-based RFE/RL – which provides high-quality reporting in more than 20 language versions, including Ukrainian, Russian, Belarusian, Armenian and Persian – has been forced to cut 90 per cent of its freelancers and furlough about 25 per cent of its staff since the Trump administration issued an executive order in March 2025 aimed at closing USAGM.

A measure of predictability returned to RFE/RL’s operations on February 3 when President Donald Trump signed the 2026 appropriations bill, which includes funding for USAGM for the next fiscal year but is roughly 25 per cent down from previous years. Congress had appropriated 148.7 million dollars for RFE/RL in the fiscal year 2025 Congressional Budget Justification.

For many local journalists and media analysts, the closure of RFE’s Romania service (Europa Libera Romania) primarily signals an erosion of investigative capacity and editorial pluralism within an already strained media environment. “This is more than the shutdown of a newsroom – it amounts to the extinguishing of a symbol,” media analyst Petrisor Obae told BIRN.

“At a time when the avalanche of fake news, disinformation and manipulation is greater than ever, the need for a benchmark of responsible journalism is more acute than at any other moment. Yet instead of reinforcing a trusted source, the Trump administration opted to close it down,” he added.

No official statement has been issued by Europa Libera Romania and, so far, none of the journalists have departed the Bucharest office, appearing to remain fully engaged in their reporting duties. In informal remarks, some staff members said the organisation has consistently provided the editorial independence required to carry out their work professionally and without interference.

The Romanian service currently employs around 20 people and is the successor to the original Radio Free Europe broadcaster, which played a crucial societal role during the Cold War, when it served as one of the few credible sources of uncensored information for the population at a time of strict state control over the domestic media. Radio Free Europe maintained operations in Romania until 2008, the year the country consolidated its status as a member of the EU. After a decade-long hiatus, it re-established its online-only Romanian service in 2018, amid mounting concerns within the US administration about disinformation and democratic backsliding in the region.

The Bulgarian service (Svobodna Evropa) had not responded to BIRN enquiries by time of publication.

Questions have inevitably turned to the future of RFE/RL’s Moldovan service (Radio Europa Libera Moldova), particularly given the small yet strategically important Southeast European country faces growing interference from Moscow in its elections and media landscape. Sources say the service is safe for this year, though is operating with a skeleton crew. Its longer-term future could be secured with proposed external funding from EU and/or non-EU sources, though the upheavals at RFE/RL have complicated this effort.


Balkan Insight

The Balkan Insight (formerly the Balkin Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN) is a close group of editors and trainers that enables journalists in the region to produce in-depth analytical and investigative journalism on complex political, economic and social themes. BIRN emerged from the Balkan programme of the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, IWPR, in 2005. The original IWPR Balkans team was mandated to localise that programme and make it sustainable, in light of changing realities in the region and the maturity of the IWPR intervention. Since then, its work in publishing, media training and public debate activities has become synonymous with quality, reliability and impartiality. A fully-independent and local network, it is now developing as an efficient and self-sustainable regional institution to enhance the capacity for journalism that pushes for public debate on European-oriented political and economic reform.

Iran’s Water Crisis: A National Security Imperative – Analysis

February 17, 2026 

By Scott N. Romaniuk, Erzsébet N. Rózsa and László Csicsmann

Iran is confronting an unprecedented water crisis. Rivers that have sustained settlements and agriculture for centuries are drying, while groundwater reserves are being extracted far beyond natural replenishment—over 70% of major aquifers are considered overdrawn. According to Isa Bozorgzadeh, spokesperson for Iran’s water industry, many plains and reservoirs have reached critically low levels. Over the past two decades, the country’s renewable water resources have declined by more than a third, pushing Iran to the brink of absolute water scarcity.

Drought cycles are becoming more frequent and severe; this past autumn marked one of the driest periods in the last 20 years in contemporary Iranian history. For decades, national development policies assumed that engineering and extraction could overcome environmental limits. Today, those limits are reasserting themselves, and shortages are moving from rural peripheries into major cities, placing pressure on a political system already managing numerous economic, social, and national security challenges. Rising scarcity underscores the multifaceted ways in which water intersects with livelihoods, public trust, and national security, creating pressures that extend from rural communities to urban centers and shaping Iran’s domestic and regional policies.

These long-term pressures are not solely the product of climate variability. They reflect cumulative policy decisions, infrastructure choices, and social priorities that have consistently prioritized water-intensive agriculture, urban expansion, and industrial development. Iran’s national security is no longer defined solely by armies, weapons, or borders—it now hinges on something far more fundamental: water. Understanding these drivers is crucial to grasping how the country arrived at its current crisis, where domestic vulnerabilities intertwine with mounting regional tensions over shared water resources.

How Iran Got Here

While droughts have made Iran’s situation worse, various studies and official reports show that the main causes are mostly related to policies and infrastructure. The Islamic Republic’s long-standing commitment to agricultural self-sufficiency—complemented by necessity due to international sanctions—prioritized national food security over environmental sustainability. Crops such as rice, wheat, and sugar beet were promoted—even in areas unsuitable for high water consumption. Subsidized water pricing and low-cost energy encouraged excessive irrigation, depleting rivers and aquifers.

Urban and industrial expansion, with Iranian urbanization standing at approximately 77 percent, has further compounded pressures on water resources. The licensing of hundreds of thousands of wells, many lacking proper oversight, has accelerated groundwater extraction far beyond natural replenishment rates. In Tehran, ageing century-old water infrastructure, including the ancient underground qanat/kariz system, contributes to significant leakage, intensifying shortages even in years of normal rainfall.

In addition, Minister Ali Abadi has noted extraordinary factors—such as disruptions from regional conflicts, including the recent 12-day war with Israel—that have further exacerbated the capital’s water stress, prompting the introduction of a recently launched plan to move the capital closer to the more water-abundant Makran region along the Gulf of Oman. In some areas, aquifers have fallen so drastically that land subsidence has become irreversible, damaging roads, buildings, and farmland. Policies intended to secure economic and national resilience instead produced resource overreach, leaving Iran highly vulnerable to both climatic variability and systemic infrastructure failures.

Water Scarcity as a Driver of Unrest and Inequality

Water scarcity increasingly threatens Iran’s social cohesion and national stability. Rural communities dependent on irrigation have witnessed orchards wither and livestock decline, prompting waves of migration to already stressed urban areas. These environmental pressures erode traditional livelihoods and ignite political grievances, as seen in demonstrations in Isfahan, Khuzestan, and other provinces under the slogan ‘We are thirsty!’ (Ma teshne im!). Residents frequently accuse authorities of misallocating water to industrial users or favored regions, while government responses often prioritize containment over addressing the root causes.

Scarcity also exacerbates long-standing regional and ethnic disparities. Inter-provincial water transfers—from Khuzestan and Chaharmahal-va-Bakhtiari to central provinces such as Isfahan and Yazd—have deepened resentment in peripheral areas. Arab communities in Khuzestan, Bakhtiari, and Lor populations in the southwest view these projects as benefiting Persian-majority industrial centers, reinforcing perceptions of historical neglect and political marginalization. Various protests in these regions, notably the farmers’ protest in Isfahan in April 2025, have occasionally escalated into clashes with security forces, road blockages, and attacks on construction sites, highlighting how hydrological stress intersects with ethnic identity, structural inequalities, and contested state–society relations.

As environmental decline accelerates, water scarcity risks transforming from an episodic trigger of unrest into a sustained driver of domestic tension and center–periphery conflict, challenging both local livelihoods and national cohesion.

Urban and Rural Vulnerability

Once considered insulated from water stress, urban areas are increasingly facing challenges to this assumption. Major cities depend on interconnected reservoirs and pipelines vulnerable to both climatic fluctuations and disruptions over long distances. Tehran, home to some 9-10 million residents (but some 15 million if the metropolitan area is considered), relies heavily on mountain reservoirs threatened by declining snowpack and rising temperatures.

Similarly, Mashhad and Shiraz have faced rotational cutoffs that strain the public’s patience, while provincial centers in arid regions occasionally experience complete supply interruptions. Significantly, the Zayandeh-Rood—meaning “life-giving river”—which gave rise to Isfahan, the Safavid capital of the 16th century, and long stood as one of Iran’s most visited tourist sites, has remained dry for several years.

As this unfolds, rural decline accelerates as irrigation fails, leaving villages effectively depopulated once wells run dry. Younger generations move toward cities or abroad in search of work, weakening traditional agricultural knowledge and local governance networks that once managed shared water. These shifts complicate national planning: Iran’s water strategy has long relied on the idea that a large agricultural sector could support food sovereignty. However, as farms disappear, this idea becomes harder to hold on to, which could force a strategic shift towards relying more on imports.

Agricultural Self-Sufficiency Under Threat

Water scarcity has fundamentally constrained Iran’s longstanding goal of agricultural self-sufficiency. With rivers declining and groundwater aquifers overdrawn, the country can no longer reliably irrigate large areas of farmland. Water-intensive crops such as wheat, rice, and sugar beet now compete for dwindling supplies, and yields are increasingly unpredictable. As a result, Iran struggles to produce enough food to feed its population of some 92 million without turning to imports.

Policies that once prioritized domestic production for strategic and ideological reasons now create tension between national food security objectives and ecological realities. Growing dependence on imported grain and other staplesexposes Iran to global market volatility, amplified by international sanctions on the Iranian banking system, diplomatic pressure from trading partners, and sharply rising domestic prices driven by hyperinflation. These economic pressures further complicate agricultural planning, forcing policymakers to balance strategic self-sufficiency against both environmental limits and escalating costs.


Water as a Tool of Power

Water scarcity does not operate solely within Iran’s borders. Across the broader Middle East, Central Asia, and South Asia, water has become intertwined with geopolitics. In the absence of international treaties on rivers (as compared to the high seas, e.g., the 1982 Washington Treaty), water sharing is left to the riparian states to work out among themselves.

Yet, with the colonial past in most of these regions and the relatively new independent statehood of most, water sharing has entered the focus of regional intra-state attention relatively late. Climate change, however, has dramatically increased this necessity, especially as control over headwaters can translate into political bargaining power, and in some cases, states have deliberately used water to pressure neighbors, assert dominance, or influence downstream economic and security outcomes.

A New Geopolitics of Headwaters

Relations between Afghanistan and Iran illustrate how upstream development carries strategic consequences. Tehran views projects on the Helmand River, vital for Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province, not only as infrastructure but also as assertions of Afghan sovereignty. Each dam threatens reduced flow to Iranian territory, prompting diplomatic strain and, at times, heated rhetoric.

Tensions also surface between Afghanistan and Pakistan over the Kabul River, where future water demand may exceed supply. Beyond irrigation, upstream development has historically been leveraged as a political tool: restricting flow to downstream users can pressure concessions on trade, security, or border negotiations. In these situations, hydrology dictates bargaining power: those who control the flow shape politics. No wonder, under Iran’s new ‘neighborhood policy’, negotiations with both neighbors include water sharing as one of the main topics.

Iran’s Options Narrowing: External Dependence on the Horizon

Self-sufficiency has been an ideological and security principle since 1979, strengthened by the reality of Iran’s general isolation following the Islamic Revolution. Yet current trends indicate that Iran may no longer meet domestic demand without external support. Proposals to import water or expand desalination signal an uncomfortable recognition: sovereignty over food and water may be eroding.

Desalination is expanding along Iran’s southern coast, but infrastructure, energy costs, and environmental implications limit scalability. Meanwhile, importing water from neighboring states introduces geopolitical vulnerability, providing potential strategic advantage for foreign governments to influence Iranian policy. Reliance on external water or agricultural imports is rapidly becoming a strategic discussion point.

Information Gaps and Public Trust

Effective management depends on transparency, but water data in Iran is often treated as confidential. Environmental assessments are rarely shared fully with the public or independent researchers, creating uncertainty about actual conditions.

This opacity encourages speculation. Communities blame mismanagement or regional favoritism; rumors circulate about unauthorized industrial withdrawals or hidden infrastructure failures. Distrust grows faster than credible communication. Institutional capacity exists within Iran to improve water governance, including strong scientific expertise.

The barrier is political: acknowledging the full scale of decline would require renegotiating priorities long framed as essential to national strength. Yet, in response to a call from religious authorities, several organized prayers for water were held across the country.

Climate Change as a Force Multiplier

Climate pressures intensify Iran’s water challenges. Higher temperatures increase evaporation from reservoirs and soil, while reduced snowpack diminishes spring melt feeding rivers. Rainfall has declined by approximately 85% in critical areas, its increasing unpredictability posing serious challenges for both immediate and long-term water resource management. In response, Iran has turned to cloud seeding to induce rainfall, though results remain limited and inconsistent. Extreme weather events, including heatwaves and sudden, localized flooding, further strain rural and urban water infrastructure while also threatening agricultural productivity and food security.

Iran cannot control these climatic drivers, but policy choices determine how severely they affect livelihoods and national security. Failures in governance and resource management amplify these trends, transforming natural variability into full-scale crises. Without coordinated adaptation strategies—ranging from investment in resilient water infrastructure to sustainable agricultural practices—climate change acts as a multiplier for existing vulnerabilities, intensifying rural depopulation, urban water stress, and social unrest.

In this way, environmental shifts do not merely add pressure; they accelerate and exacerbate every underlying economic, political, and infrastructural challenge.

Hydro-Politics and Regional Realignments

Water scarcity is increasingly shaping Iran’s regional relationships, influencing both cooperation and competition. Shared rivers and aquifers create interdependencies that constrain national policy, while scarcity amplifies the stakes of diplomacy, trade, and security. Rather than merely presenting local disputes, these dynamics now shape broader strategic calculations, affecting alliances and regional influence.

Iran faces growing downstream vulnerability and upstream dependency. In the east, tensions over transboundary rivers underscore how upstream development in Afghanistan and Pakistan can affect water availability in Iran’s border provinces, requiring careful negotiation to prevent disruption. In the west, Türkiye’s control of shared water resources limits Tehran’s leverage in Iraq and Syria, forcing Iran to combine technical cooperation, diplomatic engagement, and economic initiatives to maintain influence.

At the same time, Gulf states’ investment in desalination, water recycling, and strategic food reserves introduces asymmetries in water security capabilities, creating new competitive pressures. Scarcity also encourages selective cooperation: multilateral frameworks, cross-border infrastructure projects, and joint drought management programs are increasingly explored, though historical mistrust and diverging national priorities complicate implementation.

These pressures are reshaping strategic flexibility. Where Iran once relied primarily on military, ideological, or economic tools to project influence, hydrological realities now define its options. Access to water flows, control over shared resources, and the capacity to adapt to scarcity have become core determinants of regional bargaining power. In effect, water scarcity functions as both a constraint and a tool, compelling Iran to recalibrate alliances, balance regional competition, and integrate environmental realities into its broader strategic planning.

Water as a Boundary of Strategy

Iran’s water security dilemma demonstrates how environmental realities reshape national priorities. What was once considered a manageable challenge has evolved into a structural constraint affecting agriculture, cities, and foreign policy simultaneously.

Scarcity alters internal migration patterns, raises the likelihood of unrest, and erodes the social contract between state and citizens. Environmental experts and activists, including Nikahang Kowsar—who has been sounding the alarm for nearly two decades—trace much of the crisis to longstanding policies dating back to the reformist era of President Mohammad Khatami, showing how governance decisions interact with natural limits to shape vulnerability.

These pressures demand difficult choices between self-sufficiency and sustainability—choices that carry political risks no matter the direction taken. Beyond Iran’s borders, water scarcity sharpens competition over shared rivers and introduces new factors into regional diplomacy. Access to reliable water flows may determine economic outcomes and future alignments.

The era in which Iran could independently secure its water and food needs is fading. National strategy must now be constructed around hydrological limits rather than in defiance of them. Water, once treated as an input to growth, has become a primary boundary of what Iran can achieve at home and how it can position itself abroad.

About the authors:

Scott N. Romaniuk: Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Contemporary Asia Studies, Corvinus Institute for Advanced Studies (CIAS); Department of International Relations, Institute of Global Studies, Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary.

Erzsébet N. Rózsa: Professor at Ludovika University of Public Service; Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of World Economics, Hungary.

László Csicsmann: Full Professor and Head of the Centre for Contemporary Asia Studies, Corvinus Institute for Advanced Studies (CIAS), Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary; Senior Research Fellow, Hungarian Institute of International Affairs (HIIA).

Source: This article also appeared at Geopolitical Monitor.com

 

Rubio conveys Trump’s full support for Hungary's Orban, says bilateral ties are entering "golden age"

Marco Rubio before a joint press conference with his host Viktor Orban in Budapest on February 16. / Facebook - Viktor Orban

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By bne IntelliNews February 17, 2026

Bilateral relations with Hungary are entering a "golden age", and Washington would be willing to help Budapest financially if needed, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told his Hungarian host at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Viktor Orban on February 16 in Budapest.

Rubio arrived from Bratislava after attending the Munich Security Conference over the weekend and received a warm welcome at the Carmelite Monastery, the seat of the prime minister.

At a joint press conference with Orban, the US chief diplomat said the new golden era between the two countries was due to the strong relationship between Orban and Trump.

"Hungary’s success is also our success. It is because we want you to continue, want this economy to prosper, and want this country to do well. It’s in our national interest. Especially as long as you’re the prime minister and the leader of this country, it’s in our national interest that Hungary be successful," he added.

When asked about whether ties would remain strong in case of a change of government, Rubio said the outcome of Hungary's election was up to the voters but praised Orban's "extraordinarily strong" relationship with the US, saying it had "tangible benefits" for bilateral ties and "strong personal ties between the two leaders had significantly shaped bilateral relations".

Trump has already publicly endorsed Orban, calling him "a truly strong and powerful leader" in a social media post last week, after the Hungarian prime minister had steadfastly supported him in every election since 2016.

In his opening remarks, the Hungarian premier described the meeting with Rubio as cordial, friendly and substantive, noting that the visit had been agreed during his visit to Washington last November.

Since Trump’s inauguration, 17 new US investments have been launched in Hungary, the visa programme was restored, and Hungary has been invited to join Trump's Peace Council initiative. Orban cited achievements over the last 13 months, adding that he would travel to Washington on February 19 to sign the accession declaration.

Rubio and Orban signed energy agreements that extend to crude, gas and nuclear. Those agreements, together with an exemption allowing Hungary to use Russian oil and gas, contribute to the country's energy security and keep prices affordable for households and businesses, Orban said, adding that talks also evolved around the acquisition of Serbian oil company NIS by its Hungarian peer MOL, but he did not provide more detail.

MOL plans to buy out the majority Russian stake in the company. The deal still requires approval from Washington, which is expected to be a formality.

No new details emerged on the nuclear energy deal, but based on earlier reports, Hungary committed to acquire SMR technology from the US for $20bn. Under the agreements signed last November, Budapest will also be buying $600mn in LNG to diversify its energy supplies and $700mn in military equipment.

After returning from the White House, Orban said he had reached a financial agreement with Trump. Later, his economy minister said this financial arrangement could include a swap agreement, credit lines, and infrastructure financing, designed to strengthen Hungary’s financial stability and provide a shield in times of crisis.   

Rubio cordially offered Washington’s help to its ally if needed. "When you face financial difficulties, we are ready to provide assistance. Especially while you serve as prime minister, it is in America’s national interest to maintain strong relations between our two countries, and we appreciate your efforts in furtherance of peace. Your geopolitical role is indispensable," Rubio added.

Asked by CBS News, the secretary of ctate said Hungary’s exemption from US sanctions on Russian energy imports was the result of direct talks between the two leaders, calling it a product of their strong personal ties. He declined to speculate on the future of bilateral relations in the event of a change of government in Hungary. Earlier, Rubio contradicted the government’s claims, saying the exemption was not permanent but valid for one year. 

Rubio also addressed questions concerning Hungary’s relations with China, saying every nation pursues its own national interests and that the United States did not expect partners to isolate themselves from other countries.

Analysts commented that the US diplomat was fully aligned with the Hungarian position in these two cases, without having to confront sensitive issues. Independent media also notes that Washington’s open support for Orban in the election appeared to go beyond diplomatic norms.

Analysts said the prime minister is likely to leverage his close relationship with Trump for PR, portraying himself as the reliable leader welcomed by big global players. in the final stretch of what is shaping up to be a closely contested election campaign. 

Erik Toth, the research director at the government-funded think-tank, the Centre for Fundamental Rights, also highlighted the political fallout from Rubio's visits and Trump's endorsement. Toth said he believed that the endorsement adheres to diplomatic norms and shows that the current US administration intends to continue close cooperation with the Orban government.

At the press conference, Orban said Hungary remained ready to host a future peace summit if one were to take place. He added that his invitation for Trump to visit Hungary still stands.

When asked whether the US leader would visit Hungary in the near future, Rubio said he could not confirm such plans.