Why 🐺 Russia-NATO-Tracker picked: Belgium’s defence minister warns of ‘dark winter for Europe’ with more ‘hybrid warfare’ from Russia - Europe live

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Source: theguardian.com

<p>Theo Francken says bloc is in a ‘difficult position’ after recent increase in hybrid provocations from Moscow</p><p>Belgian defence minister Theo Francken said “there will be more hybrid threat actions” in the coming months, as he starkly warned “it will be a dark winter for Europe.”</p><p>Speaking at <a href="https://events.euronews.com/defence-space-summit-2026" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc" target="_blank">Euronews’s Defence and Space Summit</a>, Francken said hybrid warfare “is not something that Russia [has been] doing for two or three years,” but for much longer and it has “expertise” in this area, often making it difficult for western countries to investigate them and attribute responsibility.</p><p>“Europe has been very good in investing in soft power, in social security. And it’s beautiful to have a pension system, to have social welfare systems [for] when somebody gets sick, when somebody lost his job – we have everything. But when there’s war or there’s hybrid threats, we don’t have anything. So yeah, we’re in a really difficult position.”</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2026/sep/30/russia-ukraine-war-strikes-zelenskyy-putin-poland-romania-macron-sanchez-spain-europe-latest-news-updates" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc" target="_blank">Continue reading...</a>