PARIS — Tehran denied accusations by Paris that it was behind the recent series of cyberattacks targeting supermarket refrigerators in France, calling the claims “baseless and biased.”

The Iranian foreign ministry said in a statement Tuesday that it “strongly condemns” France’s “worn-out policy of making accusations against Iran.”

French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot on Monday said Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was responsible for the “unprecedented” cyberattacks against several supermarket chains last month. On Tuesday, Barrot said Paris would not “rule out anything” in its response to the attacks, which affected 700 food distribution sites.

“We’ll take all measures, including those we will not disclose publicly, which we ourselves consider proportionate and necessary to deter any further attacks and punish those responsible for this unacceptable aggression,” he said.

Iran’s ambassador to France has been summoned to the foreign ministry after French prosecutors said that they were opening an investigation into the hacks.

According to French investigators, Iran’s cyber unit linked to the IRGC, Shahid Kaveh, carried out the destructive attacks.

The French investigation will focus on the unit’s head, the Paris prosecutor’s office said in a statement, adding that about 20 fires had been started because of the cyberattack.

“The attackers took remote control of the equipment via web interfaces to trigger abnormal defrost cycles of unlimited duration, while disabling the security alerts on the sensors that were supposed to activate once a certain temperature was exceeded,” it added.

On Monday, European Council President Kaja Kallas said that the topic of alleged Iranian hacks would be discussed at next week’s European foreign affairs council. If the attribution is confirmed, she said, “[Europe’s] response should be strong.”

The European Commission is also looking into these cyberattacks, which European Agriculture and Food Commissioner Christophe Hansen described as a “deliberate attempt to disrupt our food supply chain.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced Monday that the EU will help finance some Black Sea security costs after attacks on commercial shipping — blamed on Russia — even as the main diplomatic push to end the crisis unfolds elsewhere.

“Threats, attacks and incursions are rising off the coasts of the Black Sea,” von der Leyen said at the start of her visit to Romania.

In response, she said the bloc will “fast track the work on the Black Sea Maritime Security Hub, with a clear timeline for completion and dedicated funding of €50 million.”

She also announced an additional €10 million in EU cash for Romania’s search-and-rescue operations.

She was in Varna, Bulgaria, on Tuesday and announced an additional €10 million for Bulgarian search-and-rescue.

The sums are tiny compared to the €20 billion Romania and Bulgaria are getting under the EU’s SAFE arms loans program.

The hub, announced last year, is a joint control center to be run by Romania and Bulgaria and is expected to be fully operational by the end of the year.

It aims to monitor maritime activity in real time and safeguard vital infrastructure such as undersea power and communication cables. It would offer both countries a unified view of the sea and sky, helping them detect threats before they strike.

Monday’s announcement follows weeks of mounting violence on the Black Sea. Since early October, at least nine ships have been struck in the exclusive economic zones of NATO and EU members Romania and Bulgaria; four were sunk, and 34 sailors are dead or missing.

Other ships have been hit off Russia’s shores.

Both Romania and Bulgaria raised the issue at last month’s meeting of EU leaders and are pressing for more security support. However, while Romania has blamed Russia, Bulgaria has stopped short.

Meanwhile, the U.S. is steering talks on a Black Sea ceasefire and an agreement on safe passage, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying Washington is reviewing proposals from Turkey forwarded in late October and is “open” to ideas from India.

An agreement would not end the conflict, Rubio said, but it would “solve a unique aspect” of it by easing the spillover on food security for vulnerable nations.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Oct. 21 that the bloc is working with Turkey, India and food-importing countries in Africa and other regions on a freedom-of-navigation deal. Ukraine has agreed to such an arrangement, she added, but Russia has rejected it.

Von der Leyen said the EU backs Ukraine’s call for a Black Sea ceasefire, referring to “the peace talks taking place in Abu Dhabi tomorrow with European presence.”

Commission chief spokesperson Paula Pinho gave no details on the proposals or the EU’s role. She noted a “common interest” in resolving disruptions, but declined to comment on the intentions of Turkey or the U.S.

Asked whether he foresaw a possible breakthrough this week, Ukraine’s Agriculture Minister Taras Vysotskyi was pessimistic. He said that Kyiv is “preparing to keep our farmers operating without access to the deep-water Black Sea ports for the long term.”

The Black Sea matters to both sides in the war.

The ports of Ukraine’s Greater Odesa region are main channels for its exports, including steel, iron ore and grain, and they bring in billions of dollars. Several ships hit in EU waters were carrying Ukrainian grain.

Most of Russia’s grain exports also leave through Black Sea ports such as Novorossiysk, a major oil export hub, along with Tuapse.

Other countries are deeply invested, too. Near Novorossiysk, the Caspian Pipeline Consortium terminal, partly owned by U.S. oil giants Chevron and Exxon, handles about 80% of Kazakhstan’s crude exports.

Turkey has suffered the most ship attacks, and tankers headed for Georgia have also come under fire.

Agnes Rønberg contributed reporting.

This article has been updated.

PARIS — French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot said Iran was behind the recent series of “unprecedented” cyberattacks on refrigerators in several major supermarket chains in the country last month.

“Thanks to the outstanding work of the government departments, I am able to confirm that responsibility for this attack lies with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards,” Barrot told reporters Monday at a G7 meeting in Paris. “We will impose sanctions at European level against those responsible.”

Barrot said that 700 food distribution sites in France were impacted in the cyberattack. French prosecutors said shortly after that they were opening an investigation into the hacks.

Though Barrot was only referring to the incidents reported in France, grocery stores across Europe and even French blood banks have been targeted by hackers in recent days. Cyber experts had previously raised concerns that the attacks may have been part of Russia’s ongoing hybrid warfare against Europe, though the Kremlin has denied any involvement.

In a statement, a spokesperson for France’s foreign affairs ministry said the French investigation found that Iran’s cyber unit, Shahid Kaveh, carried out the destructive attacks. Shahid Kaveh, which is linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, carries out offensive cyber operations.

The French investigation will focus on the unit’s head, the Paris prosecutor’s office said in a statement, adding that about 20 fires had been started because of the cyberattack.

“The attackers took remote control of the equipment via web interfaces to trigger abnormal defrost cycles of unlimited duration, while disabling the security alerts on the sensors that were supposed to activate once a certain temperature was exceeded,” it added.

“We just heard now that [the cyberattacks] were attributed to Iran,” European Council President Kaja Kallas said after Barrot’s statement, adding that the matter would be discussed at next week’s European foreign affairs council. If the attribution is confirmed, she said, “[Europe’s] response should be strong.”

The European Commission is also looking into these cyberattacks, which EU Agriculture and Food Commissioner Christophe Hansen described as a “deliberate attempt to disrupt our food supply chain.”

Iran’s foreign affairs ministry and its embassy in Paris did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

This story has been updated.

European Council President António Costa suggested narrowing a controversial business tax to only apply to large firms with a turnover exceeding €750 million per year, two EU diplomats briefed on the discussions told POLITICO.

Costa hopes these concessions will facilitate an overall agreement on new EU-wide levies, known as own resources, which have emerged as a major stumbling bloc in the ongoing negotiations.

The idea was mentioned in meetings, known as “confessionals,” between Costa’s head of cabinet Pedro Lourtie and EU governments Thursday, to test the waters on the most sensitive aspects in the negotiations.

Lourtie overhauled an unpopular corporate tax known as CORE — which charges a lump sum on companies’ revenues exceeding €100 million — that the European Commission proposed last year.

According to his proposal, the EU would charge a 0.05% levy, as opposed to a lump sum. It would also only apply to firms with an annual turnover of more than €750 million.

These changes are expected to soften opposition among a group of countries led by Germany that challenged CORE on the grounds that it undermines competitiveness and takes a toll on medium-sized enterprises.

Going further

But two diplomats fear these concessions will not be enough to muster support for the new levy. “I don’t think this is going to solve the problem on CORE,” one told POLITICO. They, like others in this story, were granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations.

France is pushing to introduce new taxes to reduce contributions to the EU budget.

In a concession to Paris, Costa’s team indicated that they won’t cut down on the total revenue projections from the Commission’s tax proposal from last year, which was expected to generate €65 billion annually. 

To generate additional resources for the budget, Costa’s team also suggested increasing two largely uncontroversial taxes on non-collected plastic and electronic waste that flows directly to the bloc’s budget by levying an additional 25 cents on each kilo.

The diplomats also proposed raising the share of a carbon imports’ tax that flows to the EU cash pot to 100% from the current 75%, and exploring levies on crypto firms and national spectrum auctions.

In a further concession, Lourtie suggested phasing in two taxes on tobacco products and polluting firms, known as the Emissions Trading System, for countries that are overwhelmingly affected.

Confessional diplomacy

The bilaterals, which started Thursday and will continue until next Monday, are expected to pave the way for a budget deal by the end of 2026 — before next year’s elections in Poland, France and Italy threaten to derail the negotiations.

Costa will put forward a new budget negotiating document on Nov. 21 ahead of a special summit the following week, said the two diplomats.

During Thursday’s meetings, Costa’s team signaled that the budget would be cut further, and reductions might affect regional funding known as cohesion policy.

That would be a major setback for an alliance of Southern and Eastern European countries, known as the Friends of Cohesion.

Cuts to farmers’ subsidies were deemed less likely, said the two diplomats.

CBD edibles have become a popular supplement for relaxation — but that hasn’t stopped the EU’s top court from taking a high-strung approach to the bloc’s food rules.

The Court of Justice of the EU ruled Thursday that CBD-based food products cannot be certified as organic. The hangup: they’re not technically legal on the EU market.

It’s a bummer for consumers looking to grab some gummies with CBD derived without pesticides — and for the Professional Hemp Trade Association, which launched the case in France.  

CBD, or cannabidiol, is a non-psychoactive chemical component found in marijuana that’s gained a reputation as a way to take a chill pill without getting high. In some European countries, wellness shops are using a legal grey zone to sell CBD products that aren’t explicitly marketed for human consumption — often with a wink.   

In France, some hemp sellers wanted to sell them with an organic label. But the the judges shut that down. 

The European Commission classifies natural CBD as a so-called novel food, and it has yet to receive authorization to be sold on the EU market.  

The hemp sellers had challenged the refusal by France’s National Institute for Origin and Quality to grant organic certification to CBD edibles.  

The high court said that CBD can be certified as organic only after it is authorized for sale on the EU market.  

The certification is more than a decorative badge, the court reasoned, saying it “conveys a more general promise of quality and acceptance of a given product in the eyes of consumers, with this positive image being an intended commercial effect.” Putting it on a product that has not been approved for sale could be misleading. The Court’s ruling is also consistent with earlier national-level measures. 

The organic label setback looks to be the least of hemp sellers’ problems in France: Paris ordered edible CBD products to be pulled from the shelves completely this past May.  

BRUSSELS — The European Commission is preparing a more cautious roadmap for Ukraine’s EU accession negotiations, setting out limited targets for progress in 2027 while avoiding any commitment to a membership date, according to a document obtained by POLITICO.

Brussels has long sought to bring Ukraine closer to the EU in a broader effort to secure its future after Russia’s war, with eventual membership seen as a way to anchor Kyiv firmly in European institutions and make renewed Russian aggression more difficult.

In the document, Brussels calls on Kyiv to “urgently and significantly step up the pace of the rule of law reforms.” Meeting key requirements in this area in the first half of 2027 is necessary before negotiations in individual policy areas can be provisionally concluded, the roadmap says.

The document, part of the Commission’s enlargement package to be presented Wednesday, identifies seven policy areas in which Ukraine could provisionally complete negotiations next year. It highlights how far Ukraine still has to go before joining the bloc — and the difficulty of delivering the necessary reforms while fighting a war.

Decoupling from Moldova

The document also underscores a growing divergence between Ukraine and Moldova, whose membership bids have long advanced in parallel. Moldova is now seen as being in a position to make substantially faster progress, raising the prospect that the two countries’ membership bids will effectively be decoupled.

While Brussels is targeting progress in seven policy areas for Ukraine in 2027, Moldova could complete negotiations in more than 20, the document shows.

Ukraine applied to join the EU on Feb. 28, 2022, just four days after Russia launched its full-scale invasion. Moldova and Ukraine secured candidate status together in June 2022 and formally launched membership negotiations on the same day in June 2024.

Since then, Kyiv has completed a detailed examination of how its laws compare with EU rules and negotiations have formally opened across several major policy areas. In October, Ukraine and Moldova both opened talks covering the EU’s internal market, competitiveness and economic growth.

A long way to go

Joining the EU requires far more than a political commitment. Candidate countries must bring their laws and institutions into line with EU standards across 35 negotiating areas, known in Brussels jargon as chapters. These range from agriculture and food safety to competition rules, judicial independence and foreign policy.

The Commission’s roadmap identifies only seven such areas in which Ukraine could provisionally finish negotiations in 2027. Education and culture is targeted for the first half of the year, followed by intellectual property, employment and social policy, industrial policy, research, external relations, and foreign and security policy in the second half.

The Commission acknowledges that the changes are complex and require extensive consultations, time and resources. To help Ukraine make progress, Brussels has established a dedicated task force to provide additional support to Ukrainian authorities.

The difficulties are compounded by the war, which places extraordinary demands on Ukraine’s government and parliament as they seek to pass and implement the legislation required for EU membership.

The Commission is careful in the document not to commit to an end date for Ukraine’s accession negotiations, taking a similarly cautious approach toward other EU membership frontrunners, including Albania and Moldova. Montenegro is the exception, with June 2027 envisaged as a target for signing an accession treaty.

Ukraine’s roadmap describes itself as a “living document” that can be updated as talks progress, leaving open the possibility of completing negotiations in additional policy areas sooner if reforms advance faster than expected.

The shadow of war

The uncertainty also reflects the wider challenge of admitting a country still fighting an existential war.

EU rules do not explicitly prohibit a country at war from becoming a member, but Ukraine’s accession would raise difficult questions about security, territory and the obligations EU countries would assume toward a fellow member under the bloc’s mutual assistance provisions.

Even a peace settlement would not automatically resolve those questions or remove the need for Ukraine to complete its reforms. And finishing negotiations in individual policy areas would still leave Kyiv facing further steps before membership, including an accession treaty requiring approval and ratification.

The Commission also wants talks on Ukraine’s two stalled negotiating clusters to begin by the end of 2026. These are cluster 4, covering the green agenda and sustainable connectivity, and cluster 5, covering resources, agriculture and cohesion.

The document states that the Commission considers Ukraine to have met the necessary conditions and urges the accession conference to make every effort to open the outstanding clusters before the end of the year.

Opening them would allow Ukraine to advance negotiations across the remaining policy areas, although the pace of subsequent progress will remain dependent on reforms and the relevant decisions by member countries.

Poland’s long-simmering rule-of-law issue reached boiling point this weekend. So, what now?

On today’s show, Zoya Sheftalovich and Kathryn Carlson unpack Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s efforts to undo judicial appointments made under the previous right-wing Law and Justice government. Tusk’s administration argues that removing these PiS-era appointees is essential to bringing Poland back into line with EU rule-of-law standards. But after this weekend’s turmoil, could the push backfire? And what could it mean for Tusk’s support ahead of next year’s elections?

Then, on to a crisis closer to home: Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever offered his resignation to King Philippe Monday morning, after failing to reach a budget agreement for 2027. Does that mean the government will collapse? Zoya and Katie go through what happens next.

And finally, RFK Jr.’s Make American Healthy Again campaign is coming to Brussels … at least when it comes to ultra-processed foods.

What are your thoughts on unhealthy, processed snacks and junk food? How should the bloc tackle them? Write in and let us know: You’ll find us on WhatsApp here or at +32 491 05 06 29.

Articles mentioned in this episode:

• Crisis over top court shapes Poland’s battle lines before 2027 election.
• Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s food fight is coming to Brussels.
• King mulls De Wever’s resignation as Belgian budget talks fail.

BRUSSELS — The European Commission will assess how well supermarkets are prepared to handle cyberattacks after refrigerators in dozens of stores across at least six EU countries were taken offline.

EU Agriculture and Food Commissioner Christophe Hansen told POLITICO that the attacks would be discussed at the next meeting of its Security College to assess retailers’ contingency plans and their ability to respond to incidents.

“Europe’s food supply chain must be prepared for new and evolving threats,” Hansen said. “The repeated cyberattacks on supermarkets are deeply concerning, causing economic losses for retailers and empty shelves for consumers.”

The announcement follows dozens of supermarkets across Europe reporting disruptions to their refrigeration and freezing systems on Monday.

Incidents were reported in at least six EU countries — Belgium, Luxembourg, Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands and Estonia — with some retailers reporting that refrigerator temperatures had suddenly surged to as high as 50 degrees Celsius.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen set up the Commission’s Security College in March 2025 to discuss strategic developments and threats to the EU’s internal and external security.

The Security College format lets commissioners examine attacks beyond their immediate impact on retailers. It also places the disruptions in the broader context of Europe’s vulnerability to hybrid warfare, where attacks on essential supply chains can be used to undermine public confidence.

The Security College meets periodically, separately from the Commission’s regular weekly meetings. On Friday, the Security College discussed the timing of its next meeting, but no date has been set, although heads of cabinet attending the planning meeting agreed it should take place soon, according to an EU official granted anonymity to discuss the behind-closed-door gathering.

The Security College is chaired by von der Leyen and attended by all her commissioners.

The latest disruptions follow a series of cyberattacks in France in October, when hackers appeared to remotely manipulate refrigeration systems by activating their defrosting mechanisms, causing temperatures to rise sharply and food to spoil.

In October, Commission agriculture officials met retailers affected by cyberattacks to take stock of the situation as part of the EU’s food security contingency and preparedness efforts. “We must work at every level to strengthen our preparedness and resilience,” Hansen said.

The commissioner stressed that Europe’s food security is not at risk, but warned that these incidents exposed vulnerabilities in the food supply chain, with consequences for businesses, food waste and consumer confidence.

“These are a deliberate attempt to disrupt our food supply chain and undermine consumers’ confidence in it — a warning that we must take seriously,” Hansen said.

BRUSSELS — Refrigerators in dozens of supermarkets in at least five EU countries were out of service on Monday, local news outlets reported, in what appears to be a repeat of cyberattacks that hit French stores last month.

As of Monday afternoon, there were news reports of incidents affecting supermarkets in Belgium, Luxembourg, Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands and Estonia. 

Several store managers told local media that refrigerator temperatures suddenly spiked to up to 50 degrees Celsius. This mirrors the French incidents last month, in which attackers appeared to remotely manipulate the fridges’ defrosting mechanisms so that they overheated.

It’s not confirmed that the attacks are connected or used the same software vulnerabilities that hit French chains, though one supermarket spokesperson said the incident is a cyberattack “similar to the one in France.”

Ken Munro, a cybersecurity researcher, said in an interview that supermarkets should have disconnected their refrigerators and the devices used to monitor and remotely manage them from the Internet. “I don’t accept any other excuse … particularly in light of the earlier [attacks in France],” he said.

Inti De Ceukelaire, another cyber researcher, also said the incident suggests supermarkets did not take the necessary steps even after the France attacks. “It seems that some of them simply did not get patched, which is quite ridiculous,” he said.

Belgian media reported on Monday morning that temperatures in supermarket refrigerators had suddenly spiked, forcing them to throw food away. A spokesperson for the Centre for Cybersecurity Belgium said the agency is “closely” following the incident, adding that the attackers are unknown and that it “may never be possible to identify them.”

John Billow, director of Sweden’s National Cyber Security Centre, told POLITICO that there are “similarities” to the French incidents and that the agency is in touch with affected organizations. A European Commission spokesperson said it’s aware of the incidents and is using the EU-Cyclone network to coordinate and share information.

Following France

French supermarkets were hit with a wave of similar incidents in mid-October, when attackers targeted refrigerators by Danfoss, a Danish manufacturer of store fridges. Danfoss did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The attacks in France triggered a response from the country’s prime minister and its cybersecurity agency.

Belgian supermarket chain Delhaize alerted its store managers early on Monday morning of problems with refrigerators, and Belgian broadcaster RTBF cited a store manager as saying that the problems were due to a cyberattack like those in France.

A spokesperson for the company said it is aware of an “IT incident affecting the refrigeration systems in a number of Delhaize stores.” A spokesperson for Colruyt, which operates Spar stores in Belgium, said in a statement that fridges in “around five” Spar stores have been affected. “We are currently doing everything we can to resolve the issue,” they said, adding that no Colruyt stores have been affected. 

A Carrefour spokesperson confirmed that 15 of its 700 stores have been affected, and that none of its larger “hypermarket” stores are among them. All stores remain open, they said.

Stores in Sweden have also been hit. A spokesperson for supermarket chain ICA confirmed an “incident overnight affecting a small number of ICA stores operating outside ICA’s central network” which affected its fridges and freezers. 

A Coop spokesperson said seven of its 800 stores were affected but the situation, which is “contained and under control.” In one case, a refrigeration system began to generate heat, they said. Last month in France, the attacks caused at least one fire.

Like the public authorities, cyber researchers are looking for signs of who may be responsible. The fact that the attacks have happened again is evidence to suggest a hostile nation could be behind the attacks rather than young hacker pranksters, De Ceukelaire said. Munro, however, said he believes a “copycat” is behind Monday’s attacks.

“This won’t be the end of it,” Munro added. “There will be more.”

This article has been updated.

BRUSSELS — The Make America Healthy Again crusade against Big Food is crossing the Atlantic.

Donald Trump’s health secretary has made packaged, mass-produced munchies one of the targets of his health agenda. And while Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s broadsides against vaccines have alarmed Brussels he has found an ally in the European Commission on this pillar of the MAHA mission.

Health Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi — former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s man in Brussels — has backed Kennedy’s push, saying Europe and the U.S. share an ambition to tackle unhealthy diets. 

“I welcome the US – including Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – putting a stronger spotlight on this agenda including the #eatrealfood campaign,” Várhelyi wrote on LinkedIn after his appearance at the USA-EU Transatlantic Business Summit in Brussels earlier this year.

But sharing an ambition is the easy part. Deciding what ultra-processed food is — and whether or how it should be regulated: not so much.

At the heart of the debate is a growing body of research linking UPFs to conditions such as obesity and diabetes, risks everyone says they want to reduce. But the challenge is translating that evidence into public health policy without dictating what people eat. 

For industry, the priority is protecting personal choice. For public health advocates, the problem is systemic. What appears to be an individual choice is often the result of inequality, they argue — influenced by income, education and a food environment that can make healthier options harder to access.

The issue has been pitting health advocates against Big Food companies on multiple continents for years now — but global momentum is moving toward regulation as the World Health Organization prepares to unveil new tools to help policymakers this week. 

The “million dollar question,” as health activist Liz Arnanz put it, is how to define ultra-processed foods. 

The term might bring to mind salty chips, preservative-filled pastries and sugary drinks, but that category can also include whole-grain bread or fortified yogurt.

“We are seeing a huge increase of deaths linked to unhealthy diets,” said Arnanz, of the NCD Alliance, an NGO fighting against noncommunicable diseases. Not only are UPFs usually “high in fats and sugar and sodium,” she argued, but there is also “an independent unhealthiness layer of the processing of food.”

Her last point is a controversial one, directly disputed by industry and up for debate among scientists. Where health advocates see cheap junk food that’s chemically engineered to be addictive, the industry can point to innovations that make products more nutritious, less expensive and safer to eat, for longer.

Echoes of the tobacco debate

For all the increasingly tough talk around UPFs from both Kennedy and Várhelyi, concrete regulation remains scarce in both Washington and Brussels. 

Latin America has arguably been the trailblazer, with Brazil a leading example. It became one of the first countries to explicitly tell its population to avoid UPFs, and backed this up with rules to limit them in schools. On the international level, the WHO is developing its own global guidance, with plans to present a food profiling tool intended to help governments decide on UPF regulations on Monday at an event in Nuremberg, Germany.

The global health body has come down hard on the UPF industry. It accused it in a 2024 report of using the same playbook as alcohol and tobacco industries “to influence entire systems,” from “political lobbying and spreading misinformation and disinformation in the media, to harmful financial practices, and targeted marketing strategies directed at children and young people.”

Connecting the consumption of processed foods with the tobacco and fossil fuel industries is “irresponsible and outrageously misleading,” said Rafael Sampson, a senior manager for public affairs at the trade association FoodDrinkEurope. The WHO report, he added, “ignores” that the science around UPFs remains contested.

Carrots or taxes

European health advocates are convinced that Brussels should act, but they’re divided over which tools to use — and how far to take the tobacco comparison. 

Suzy Sumner, who heads the Brussels office of the Foodwatch advocacy group, takes a page from the playbook against cigarettes and alcohol, backing taxes on junk food, marketing restrictions to children and front-of-pack labels. 

Marleen Kestens, manager for cardiovascular disease prevention policies at the European Heart Network, backs more positive incentives, adding that food should not be treated like tobacco.

“We would be much more in favor of subsidizing those products that people should consume more of, rather than having taxes on products that people should eat less,” Kestens said.

The Commission, meanwhile, is waiting for the results of a study on the potential health risks of UPFs, set to land in March 2027. Until then, it is reluctant to “prejudge the outcomes,” the Commission said in a statement to POLITICO. 

Despite a “growing body of evidence,” the statement said, “certain impacts (such as environmental and social) are less well explored at present.”

One thing that’s off the table: The Commission “of course has no intention to decide what citizens should eat or not,” the statement stressed. 

In fact, the Commission did flirt with using taxes to discourage people from buying unhealthy UPFs, in a leaked draft of its plan to tackle cardiovascular disease. But that dropped out of the final version. 

Instead, Várhelyi told MEPs early this year, the idea is to “use financial incentives to push the industry to reformulate the products” while trying to inform consumers about UPF health risks. 

Those types of policies are more likely to get buy-in from manufacturers. After all, the sector has already been working on both tasks “for decades,” said Sara Lamonaca, FoodDrinkEurope’s director of consumer information, nutrition and health.

The Commission’s caution on moving forward sits awkwardly with Europe’s deep-rooted resistance to food industrialization. Both at national and EU level, regulators have hardly shied away from limiting what ends up on citizens’ plates, from restrictions on genetically modified vegetables to a ban on selling plant-based meat substitutes under names like “veggie bacon.” 

“Regulating ultra-processed food and the food environments more broadly is something where the European region is lagging behind,” NCD Alliance’s Arnanz said.

America first

Even Washington has gone further than Brussels in turning words into action. The U.S. is currently moving toward a first definition of ultra-processed food. Back in January, Kennedy announced new dietary guidelines, warning Americans against highly processed foods and calling for a reduction in sugar intake.

“It’s beyond Europe now,” said Foodwatch’s Sumner. “It’s out of the box in a way now, and I think it’s going to be very difficult to try to pull back and say, ‘Oh, actually, no, there is no problem with these products at all.’”

The industry is adamant that the focus shouldn’t be on the P-word: “There is not enough evidence to use the level of processing as a basis for issuing dietary recommendations or public health policy,” Lamonaca said.

As the U.S. midterms and Brussels’ UPF study deadline draw closer, expect the lobbying to intensify on both sides of the Atlantic.

“The fight will be huge as usual,” said Kestens.

MONTREAL — Canada embraced the European Union’s offer of “associate membership” after a two-day summit at which Brussels and Ottawa gave themselves until next June to work out what their new relationship will look like.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s endorsement of the proposal by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen followed weeks of hesitation, a hostile response from U.S. President Donald Trump and pushback from EU heavyweight Germany.

“In the coming months, we will determine the full substance, scale, and scope of this new form of membership,” Carney told a press conference on Friday at the end of the two-day summit at the Port of Montreal. 

“Today, we move towards associate membership for Canada,” Carney said, describing it as “the deepest possible partnership short of accession.”

The two sides have set a June 2027 deadline to determine the terms and boundaries of their intensifying relationship — an alliance that comes with a payment schedule. Carney danced around a question pressing him on how much associate membership will cost the Canadian public.

“We don’t view this as paying, personally,” Carney said, stressing the alliance as a “positive” project.

Von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa, standing either side of Carney, presented the experiment as a necessary survival strategy to thrive in an increasingly dangerous world.

“The concept of an associate member is uncharted territory but we have the ambition, trust and creativity to shape it together,” Von der Leyen told reporters. “To be crystal clear, this is not a partnership against anybody, but for our common strength.”

Canadian government officials who spoke to reporters after the press conference confirmed legislation won’t be necessary to legitimize Canada’s EU associate membership status.

“Our relationship is so special that we want to create something new — to go beyond a simple association, everything short of a full EU membership,” said Costa, pitching a new model for non-European countries to integrate more closely with the bloc. “Our association will be the closest, deepest and most unique of its kind.”

Irritants persist

Despite the upbeat rhetoric, some longstanding trade disputes remained unresolved after the summit.

Carney told reporters the two sides had reached an agreement on carveouts from a landmark EU anti-deforestation law, but Canadian government officials subsequently walked back his assertion.

The issue remains part of ongoing trade discussions, one official said, noting progress in addressing what Canada views as flaws in the legislation. The officials were granted anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic and trade negotiations.

Another irritant has been whether Canada would qualify for “Made in Europe” status under the EU’s Industrial Accelerator Act, a landmark measure that would seek to channel public procurement spending in sectors ranging from green energy to automotive toward locally produced goods. 

Von der Leyen said the regulation proposed earlier this year by the Commission foresaw including Canada as a free-trade partner, but added that it was now subject to review by EU lawmakers and governments.

“The Industrial Accelerator Act has been proposed by the Commission to include all countries with whom we have free-trade agreements. So automatically Canada would be in,” she said in response to a question. 

“Of course now the proposal has to go through the co-legislative process. But our proposal is very clear in including Canada.”

Despite months of preparations, the summit itself was chaotic, with agenda details confirmed at short notice and bilateral meetings split between two locations. The informal arrangements were intended to encourage more face time between EU commissioners and Canadian ministers, who are set to see much more of each other.

Canadian ministers have been invited to attend more meetings with their EU counterparts as part of a plan to deepen political alignment. Recent participation by Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand and International Trade Minister Maninder Sidhu in informal EU meetings has served as a trial run.

Carney himself is expected in Dublin in two weeks, having accepted Costa’s invitation to join an informal European Council meeting.