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Welcome back to the Weekend Wire, the first of 2026. For everyone hoping to gently ease into the new year like a warm bath, we have bad news, events of the first few days of MMXXVI are enough to give you whiplash. Unsurprisingly, today’s Weekend Wire has a distinctly American flavour and we’re here to guide you through it all.
Before we start
Because our next two stories were likely timed to distract from it, let’s briefly mention the thing Trump doesn’t want us to talk about. As US lawmakers returned from their holidays, attention was expected to turn back to the Trump administration’s breach of their legal requirement to publish all files related to disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein by 19th December.
With the files suspected to include deeply embarrassing and potentially incriminating evidence against the US President, on Wednesday Trump’s justice department confirmed [ [link removed] ] they had so far reviewed and released a mere 1% of the cache and all heavily redacted. Go figure.
The sp-oils of war
The dizzying pace at which events in Venezuela developed last weekend stunned the world. From beginning to end, the abduction of President Maduro (a doubtlessly unpleasant dictator) took just over two hours [ [link removed] ].
Maduro and his wife, indicted on charges of narco-terrorism, now preside in a Brooklyn detention facility some 2,100 miles from Caracas. The intervention of an American President in the happenings of a Latin American country is hardly novel - just ask Chileans, Bolivians, or Nicaraguans. However, what is perhaps new is the brazen openness with which President Trump has admitted his motivations are driven by oil, failing to mention democracy once in his public comments following the raid.
Trump’s announcement that Venezuela would be turning over ‘50 million barrels of oil’ [ [link removed] ] to the US came as he further announced that he expected American companies to be producing oil in the South American country within 18-months. And in case you thought he was doing this on behalf of the American people - he then confirmed he would be managing the loot personally.
Concerns about the legality of the operation have dominated headlines this week with many legal scholars decrying the action as illegal and criminal [ [link removed] ]. Over on this side of the Atlantic - Keir Starmer and many European leaders chose to be more coy - with EU chief Ursula von der Leyen stating that the bloc was ‘following the situation closely’ [ [link removed] ]. Whatever the politics, the episode will doubtlessly be seized on by Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping as they seek to impose their own will on their neighbours.
Green eyed monster
The desecration of the rules-based international order by Trump took another dramatic turn later in the week as he and his administration made clear their intent to ‘acquire’ sovereign European territory. Speaking on Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the President was “actively” [ [link removed] ]discussing an offer to buy Greenland.
European leaders were forced to publish a letter reaffirming that “Greenland belongs to its people.” after Stephen Miller refused to rule out military action [ [link removed] ] to wrest control of the island. An attack on a NATO member by another NATO member would be the death knell of the organisation which has been a xxxxxx against World War 3 since the end of World War 2.
Further questions are raised when looking at the Lisbon Treaty Article 42(7) which obligates all EU states to assist by “all means in their power” [ [link removed] ] if another member is attacked. Whether any country within the EU would respond to an annexation attempt or whether they even could seems unlikely at the current moment.
Boots on the ground
Trump’s overtures to Greenland overshadowed what was, on the face of it, a pretty significant meeting in Paris this week of the Coalition of the Willing - those European leaders still interested in seeing Putin fail in his invasion of Ukraine. On Tuesday, following a meeting with US representatives and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, both Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron pledged they are ready to deploy British and French troops to Ukraine [ [link removed] ] in the event of a ceasefire.
The move was strongly criticised by the leader of the opposition who suggested it put Britain on track to a direct military conflict with Russia. However, former British Ambassador to the US and national security advisor Kim Darroch argues that the move was a precondition to Europe having any say in what eventually plays out in Ukraine, and that Putin’s unwillingness to accept anything short of almost total capitulation from the West means significant numbers of British boots won’t be in Ukraine any time soon. Read his full piece [ [link removed] ]only in the Best for Britain Wire.
High Seize
A Russian submarine, the shadow fleet, RAF air cover, and covert American forces; it is a plot that would not look out of place in a James Bond film. Yet off the coast of Bond’s native Scotland such a scene played out as US troops boarded a Russian tanker on Wednesday said to be a part of the shadow fleet used by Iran, Russia, and Venezuela to avoid Western sanctions.
The Marinera (aka Bella 1) has been under sanction since June 2024, accused of carrying illicit goods for the terrorist group Hezbollah. The use of a Russian submarine to guard the ship is the latest example of Russian naval presence in the Atlantic, following the incursion of a spy ship into UK waters [ [link removed] ] late last year.
Defence Minister Jonathan Healey made a late appearance in the House of Commons on Wednesday evening confirming that the RAF assisted the Americans with refuelling and surveillance. Responding to questions regarding the involvement of the RAF in the mission, UK Minister Douglas Alexander said that the government would “continue to look to how we can close down those channels of financing that are funding Putin’s war machine” [ [link removed] ].
Tehran teeters
It’s something that would have dominated headlines in any other week, but anger in Iran reached new heights with Friday marking the 13th consecutive day of protests. The unrest has been sparked by the collapse of Iran’s currency, with demonstrations now reported in more than 100 cities and towns across the nation [ [link removed] ].
In a rare attempt at appeasement, the Iranian government offered citizens a monthly payment of £5 earlier this week (roughly equivalent to a day’s pay). It marks a clear break from their traditional response to civil disobedience - hard-nosed repression and dismissing dissent as treason. The situation escalated further on Thursday after reports the regime had begun an internet blackout on the country [ [link removed] ], hindering the ability of protesters to communicate with one another.
With the Iranian currency now worth around 80% less against the dollar [ [link removed] ] than this time last year, and inflation running at roughly 42%, the government appears weaker than it has been in many years. After a year in which Iran’s military power was dramatically reduced by the dismantling of many of its proxy networks across the Middle East, pro-democracy forces [ [link removed] ] are hoping this could become Iran’s Berlin Wall moment.
“A public execution”
Six months since Trump allocated $75billion to his anti-immigrant militia of masked thugs (AKA ICE) - who have been abducting people off US streets to imprison in camps - this week perhaps the inevitable happened when trigger-happy ideologues are allowed to run amok. On Wednesday, an ICE agent shot and killed a 37 year old woman in her car. Despite clear footage [ [link removed] ] of the incident (upsetting content warning), Trump mouthpieces demanded we ignore the evidence of our eyes, claiming the shooting was carried out in self defence. US Democrats described the incident as a “public execution”.
On Monday, the Times [ [link removed] ] reported that the government was preparing new legislation that would allow the UK to align with the EU on food, plant and animal welfare standards, and lay the legal framework for the implementation of a new EU-UK energy trading scheme. It marks the clearest sign yet that both sides are moving from warm words to the implementation of some of the things that were agreed at the summit last May which should help bring supermarket prices and lecky bills down.
But as our CEO wrote in the Guardian this week [ [link removed] ], these welcome moves only represent part of what needs to happen by this year’s summit, and that phase two of Starmer’s Brexit reset must go even further.
Cheerful News of the Week
With the NHS saying that around one in five kids are now obese, on Monday the UK put junk food ads on a strict diet [ [link removed] ]. Television adverts for food high in sugar, salt and fat are now only permitted after 9pm and are completely banned online.
Everyone is still free to buy their favourite treats whenever and in whatever quantity they like, but it is hoped that this move will stop our most impressionable citizens being force-fed content designed to make them eat unhealthily.
Phew… after that one I think we need a stiff drink - dry January be damned! Jess will be back next week for her inaugural Weekend Wire of 2026. Until then, hold your autonomous overseas territories close.
Have a great weekend!
Joshua Edwicker & Niall McGourty
Best for Britain
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