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On 20 October 2025, President Donald J. Trump and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese signed at the White House the "United States-Australia Framework for Securing of Supply in the Mining and Processing of Critical Minerals and Rare Earths" — a non-binding common-policy instrument committing both governments to provide at least USD 1 billion each in financing within six months (USD 3bn+ joint commitment against an USD 8.5bn project pipeline and a stated USD 53bn recoverable-resource pipeline). The framework establishes a US-Australia Critical Minerals Supply Security Response Group co-led by the US Secretary of Energy and the Australian Minister for Resources, mandates streamlined permitting for mining/separation/processing projects, and explicitly couples the US demand-side architecture (DPA Title III + Defense Logistics Agency stockpile) to Australia's Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve. Concurrent with signing, EXIM issued seven Letters of Interest totalling USD 2.2bn (unlocking up to USD 5bn) to Arafura Rare Earths, Northern Minerals, Graphinex, La Trobe Magnesium, VHM, RZ Resources, and Sunrise Energy Metals; the US Department of War separately committed to a 100 metric-ton-per-year advanced gallium refinery in Western Australia, and Australia took USD 200m concessional equity in the Alcoa-Sojitz Wagerup gallium project and USD 100m equity in the Arafura Nolans rare-earths project.

On 18 October 2025 the Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania adopted a package of amendments to the Defence and Security Industry Law (XIV-2647, originally adopted May 2024), the Law on Public Procurement in Security and Defence, the Law on Control of Weapons and Ammunition, and cross-cutting territorial-planning and construction laws. The central measure, proposed by the Ministry of Economy and Innovation (EIMIN), replaces the full construction-permit requirement for defence-production facilities with a notification-of-commencement procedure, compressing typical procurement-to-groundbreaking timelines from approximately 2–2.5 years to a few months. Complementary provisions reserve public-land investment plots for defence projects, enable defence-industry development outside designated military territories, and enshrine industrial cooperation as a procurement principle requiring foreign OEMs fulfilling Lithuanian defence contracts to source a defined share of obligations from Lithuanian-registered entities. The package directly enables inbound defence-industrial FDI from Rheinmetall (155 mm artillery-shell JV) and the Northrop Grumman / Nammo medium-calibre ammunition programme at the state-owned Giraitė Armament Factory.

India's Ministry of Defence signed a Rs 659.47 crore (~USD 74.3 million) contract on 15 October 2025 with a consortium led by MKU Ltd (lead member) and Medbit Technologies Pvt Ltd for Night Sight (Image Intensifier) devices and accessories for the Indian Army's 7.62x51mm SIG716 assault rifles. The procurement is categorised as Buy (Indian-IDDM) — requiring greater than 51% Indigenous Design, Development and Manufacture content — under India's Aatmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India) defence-procurement framework, and is expected to benefit MSME component and raw-material suppliers.

On 15 October 2025 the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, acting under the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, designated 39 entities and specified 51 vessels — including, for the first time, Russia's two largest integrated oil majors PJSC Rosneft Oil Company and PJSC Oil Company Lukoil — for supporting Russia's energy, defence and financial sectors. 51 vessels (44 identified as "shadow fleet" tankers) were specified for transporting Russian crude oil and LNG in evasion of the G7 price cap. The package also introduced a ban on importing oil products refined in a third country from Russian-origin crude, closing a refined-product loophole in the price-cap regime.

On 10 October 2025 Vietnam's Government issued Decree No. 259/2025/NĐ-CP, establishing the country's first comprehensive statutory framework for strategic trade control — covering the export, temporary import for re-export, transshipment, transit, and cross-border trade of strategic goods defined as: (a) WMD-related items, (b) conventional weapons, and (c) dual-use goods spanning nuclear, electronics, telecommunications, sensors, aviation, maritime, aerospace, biochemical, metals, and chemical categories. The decree creates a Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT) licensing regime with an ICP (Internal Compliance Programme) fast-track for certified exporters of two or more years' standing, and includes catch-all provisions requiring licensing even for unlisted goods where WMD end-use or a designated end-user is suspected. Structurally, the decree represents Vietnam's transition from ad-hoc export-management provisions under legacy Decree 69/2018/NĐ-CP to a unified strategic-trade-control architecture analytically aligned with the Wassenaar Arrangement, Australia Group, Nuclear Suppliers Group, and MTCR control-list architecture. It positions Vietnam as a compliant strategic-goods manufacturing hub within the US-led friend-shoring supply chain, directly preceding the US announcement in February 2026 of Vietnam's removal from EAR Country Groups D:1–D:3.

China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and General Administration of Customs (GAC) jointly issued Announcement No. 58 of 2025 on 9 October 2025, adding high-energy-density lithium-ion batteries (cells and packs, >=300 Wh/kg), artificial graphite anode materials, related production equipment, and key manufacturing technologies to the dual-use export control list under licence requirement. The controls were scheduled to take effect 8 November 2025 but were suspended the day before via Announcement No. 70 (2025), which deferred entry-into-force until 10 November 2026 in the context of the US-China Busan economic-trade arrangement. Controls remain legislatively adopted and will become operative unless the suspension is renewed or withdrawn.

China's Ministry of Commerce on 9 October 2025 issued Announcements No. 61 and No. 62, jointly constituting the largest single architectural escalation of PRC export controls to date. No. 61 expands the controlled rare-earth list from 7 to 12 of 17 elements (adding holmium, erbium, thulium, europium, ytterbium) and — for the first time — imposes extraterritorial application via a 0.1% de-minimis rule, a foreign-direct-product (FDP) rule, and a 50%-affiliate rule, directly mirroring US BIS architecture. No. 62 places rare-earth extraction, smelting, separation, magnet manufacturing, and recycling technologies (including IP licensing, investment, and provision to foreign persons) under export licensing. PRC-direct exports were controlled from publication; the de-minimis and FDP offshore-items provisions were due to take effect 1 December 2025. On 7 November 2025 MOFCOM Announcement No. 70 suspended both measures until 10 November 2026 as part of the post-APEC Trump-Xi tariff detente — see amendments block.

China's Unreliable Entity List Working Mechanism, led by MOFCOM, issued Announcement [2025] No. 10 on 9 October 2025 designating 14 foreign entities — Dedrone by Axon Inc., DZYNE Technologies Incorporated, Elbit Systems of America LLC, Epirus Inc., AeroVironment Inc., Exelis Inc., Alliant Techsystems Operations LLC, BAE Systems Inc., Teledyne FLIR LLC, VSE Corporation, Cubic Global Defense, Recorded Future Inc., the Halifax International Security Forum, and TechInsights Inc. (with nine named subsidiaries) — for engaging in military-technical cooperation with Taiwan, harmful statements concerning China, and assisting foreign governments in suppressing Chinese enterprises. The measures (i) prohibit the listed entities from China-related import-export activity, (ii) ban new investment in Chinese territory, and (iii) for the first time under the UEL framework explicitly prohibit Chinese organisations and individuals from transmitting data or providing sensitive information to the listed entities. Issued the same day as MOFCOM/GAC Announcements No. 61/62 extending rare-earth export controls extraterritorially under a 0.1% de minimis content rule, the package marks the first UEL deployment targeting counter-drone original equipment manufacturers and the first to introduce a data-transmission restriction.

Presidential Decree No. 693 of 30 September 2025 ("On certain particularities of the sale of property held in federal ownership"), signed by Vladimir Putin and entered into force on the day of its official publication, creates an accelerated pathway for disposing of federally-owned property in cases determined by a separate decision of the President, where the goal is to ensure the Russian Federation's defence capability and security. Market valuation and the appraisal report must be completed within 10 business days of signing the appraisal contract; PSB Bank JSC (formerly Promsvyazbank, the state-controlled defence-procurement bank) is designated as the sale-organising agent and seller-on-behalf-of-the-state. The Decree also authorises the President to set special features of how Russian legislation on privatisation, joint-stock companies, limited-liability companies, the securities market, banks and competition protection applies to such sales. Expressly framed as a counter-measure to "unfriendly" actions by the United States and its allies; structurally the disposal-mechanism complement to the foreign-asset external- administration and seizure decrees (95/322/520/442) — the fast-track liquidation channel that converts seized or nationalised assets into state-budget cash for defence purposes.

The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), within the U.S. Department of Commerce, published a final rule in the Federal Register on September 30, 2025 (FR Doc 2025-18992) rescinding the April 30, 2024 Firearms Export License Requirements interim final rule in its entirety, with the sole exception of preserving the new Export Control Classification Numbers (ECCNs) it had introduced for firearms and ammunition. The rule also amends the EAR to remove the Congressional notification requirement for certain semi-automatic firearms license applications. It is effective on publication.

Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) revised its Foreign End-User List (外国ユーザーリスト) — the reference list of foreign organisations for which WMD/missile or, for the first time, conventional-weapons development concerns cannot be excluded, used to trigger catch-all export-licence requirements. The revision adds 92 entities (from China, Hong Kong, North Korea, Russia, Pakistan, Iran and the UAE) and removes 5 entities (from China, Iran and India), taking the list to 835 entities across 15 countries and regions — a net increase of 87. The revised list applies from 9 October 2025, the same date Japan's broader catch-all conventional-weapons supplementary export-control review took effect.

China's Ministry of Commerce issued Announcement No. 51 of 2025 on 25 September 2025, adding three US entities — Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. (NYSE: HII, the largest US military shipbuilder), Planate Management Group, and Global Dimensions LLC — to China's Export Control List (出口管制 管控名单), effective the same day. The listing prohibits Chinese exporters from supplying dual-use items to the three firms and requires any ongoing related export activity to cease immediately. MOFCOM cited the firms' "military-technical cooperation with China's Taiwan region" as the trigger, issued in parallel with a same-day Unreliable Entity List designation of three other US firms (Saronic Technologies, Aerkomm, Oceaneering International).

China's MOFCOM Unreliable Entity List Working Mechanism designated three US firms — Saronic Technologies, Aerkomm Inc., and Oceaneering International — on 25 September 2025, effective the same day, under Article 2 of the Provisions on the Unreliable Entity List (MOFCOM Order No. 4 of 2020) and citing the Foreign Trade Law, the National Security Law, and the Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law. MOFCOM's stated trigger is the firms' "so-called military-technical collaboration with China's Taiwan region." Measures bar the designees from China-related import/export activity and new investment in mainland China, with entry/work-permit restrictions on relevant management personnel.

India's Ministry of Defence signed a contract worth over Rs 62,370 crore (excluding taxes, ~USD 7.5 billion) with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) on 25 September 2025 for 97 Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Mk1A — 68 single-seat fighters and 29 twin-seat trainers — for the Indian Air Force. The acquisition falls under the "Buy (India-IDDM)" (Indigenously Designed, Developed and Manufactured) category of the Defence Acquisition Procedure 2020 and carries an indigenous-content requirement of over 64%, incorporating 67 additional indigenous items compared with the prior January 2021 LCA Mk1A contract. Deliveries begin 2027-28 and run over six years, supported by a vendor base of roughly 105 Indian component manufacturers.

The European Investment Fund (EIF), part of the EIB Group, committed EUR 30 million (~USD 35 million) at first closing on 17 September 2025 to Sienna Hephaistos Private Investments S.C.A. SICAV-RAIF, a Luxembourg-domiciled fund managed by Sienna Investment Managers (France). The commitment is the inaugural investment under the InvestEU Defence Equity Facility (DEF), an EU financial instrument created to close the financing gap faced by SMEs and midcaps in Europe's defence supply chain. Sienna Hephaistos is described as the first private credit vehicle in Europe dedicated exclusively to defence-sector financing, providing debt capital rather than equity to defence-linked suppliers. Global Trade Alert separately logs the transaction as a "red"-flagged state-linked equity/financial-investment-support intervention.

The European Investment Bank signed a EUR 450 million loan with Thales to finance the group's 2025-2027 research and development investment programme in aeronautics and radar. The aeronautics stream targets safety and efficiency improvements for civil and military flight; the radar stream funds modernisation of existing equipment and development of a new generation of civil and military radar systems and software. The EIB frames the deal as its first-ever corporate loan to Thales and one of the largest it has extended to Europe's security and defence sector, part of a EUR 3.5 billion (3.5% of 2025 financing) EIB Group allocation to security and defence.

Denmark's Folketing enacted Lov nr. 1097 af 15 September 2025, introduced by the Forsvarsministeriet under the September 2025 defence agreement (forsvarsforlig), establishing a statutory fast-track framework that exempts building/construction projects and operational activities serving significant national-defence or civil-emergency-preparedness purposes from standard requirements including building permits and environmental approvals. The law enables a Forsvarsministeriet-issued administrative derogation from spatial-planning and environmental law where necessary to achieve the project's objectives, directly operationalising Denmark's 50 billion DKK Defence Acceleration Fund capacity build-out. A sunset clause causes the law to expire automatically at end-2028. First confirmed applications include a new national ammunition production facility in Elling (north Jutland) and a factory in Vojens (south Jutland) for solid-propellant rocket-motor production by Ukrainian company Fire Point — the latter representing cross-border defence-industrial FDI from a non-EU operator into a NATO member state for a strategically sensitive propellant category.

On 12 September 2025 the UK government, acting under the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, designated 3 individuals and 27 entities — 19 Russian, plus third-country intermediaries in Thailand (3), Hong Kong (3), India (1) and Türkiye (1) accused of supplying electronics, chemicals and explosives used in Russian missile and weapons production — and proscribed 70 vessels (oil tankers and cargo ships, identified by IMO number) linked to Russia's shadow fleet evading the G7 crude price cap. The package brings the UK's cumulative tanker designations to nearly 500, more than any other single jurisdiction.

Bpifrance and Crédit Mutuel Arkéa's corporate banking arm launched "Avance Défense +," a EUR 500 million short-term working-capital financing facility dedicated to France's Base Industrielle et Technologique de Défense (BITD), split evenly with EUR 250 million from each institution. The mechanism lets defence prime contractors pay suppliers ahead of invoice due dates or defer their own payments while subcontractors are settled on time, and lets SMEs and mid-cap suppliers convert invoices into working-capital liquidity via the Tréso2 digital platform (built by Pytheas Capital). Over 4,500 BITD actors are eligible.

The MoEFCC Impact Assessment Division issued an Office Memorandum on 8 September 2025 categorically exempting all mining projects involving atomic minerals (uranium, thorium and the 12 minerals under the Atomic Energy Act 1962), the 30 critical minerals notified by the Ministry of Mines on 28 June 2023, and separately designated strategic minerals from the mandatory public-consultation stage (para 7(i)) of the EIA Notification 2006, invoking the existing national-defence and strategic-considerations clause. Exempted projects will instead undergo comprehensive appraisal by the relevant Sectoral Expert Appraisal Committee (SEAC/EAC) at the central level regardless of project size, bypassing the standard Category-A/B thresholding architecture. The measure was issued in response to formal requests from the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), and directly accelerates the approval pipeline for the National Critical Mineral Mission (Rs 34,300 crore, 2025-2031).

On 8 September 2025, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced a nine-measure package against Israel over the Gaza war, the centrepiece being urgent approval of a Royal Decree-Law to permanently codify in law the arms embargo Spain had applied de facto since October 2023 — a total ban on buying and selling arms, ammunition, military equipment and dual-use goods with Israel, plus a ban on port transit of fuel for the Israeli military and a ban on Israeli state aircraft carrying defence material transiting Spanish airspace. The package also bans importing, advertising and marketing products originating from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. The Council of Ministers formally approved the measure as Real Decreto-ley 10/2025 on 23 September 2025; it was published in the BOE on 24 September 2025 (BOE-A-2025-18831) and validated by Congress on 8 October 2025 (178–169). Spain's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Business separately disclosed that 219 defence-material export/import licences to Israel had been denied since October 2023, against a bilateral trade backdrop of roughly €50M in Spanish arms exports to Israel (Jan 2023–Jun 2024) and at least €54.4M in Spanish imports of Israeli arms/munitions (Oct 2023–May 2025, DataComex code 93).

On 8 September 2025, the UK Ministry of Defence published the Defence Industrial Strategy 2025 — "Making Defence an Engine for Growth" (CP 1388) — the first comprehensive cabinet-level UK defence industrial strategy in over a decade and the sector plan for Defence under the UK Modern Industrial Strategy umbrella (IS-8). The strategy was published alongside the Strategic Defence Review 2025 and operationalises the largest sustained defence- spending increase since the Cold War (rising to 2.6% of GDP by 2027 with ambition to 3% in the next Parliament). It defines six priority outcomes (growth, backing UK businesses, defence innovation, resilient industrial base, procurement transformation, enduring partnerships); establishes UK Defence Innovation (UKDI) within the MOD with a ringfenced £400m budget to accelerate dual-use technology; identifies priority defence capabilities (combat air, complex weapons, directed-energy weapons, next- generation land and maritime systems) plus dual-use sub-sectors (quantum, drones/autonomy, space, AI, cyber, engineering biology, advanced connectivity); and flags resilience priorities in steel, construction, energetic materials, batteries, semiconductors and rare earths.

Turkey's Medium-Term Programme 2026-2028 (Orta Vadeli Program, OVP), published in the Resmi Gazete on 7 September 2025 by the Presidency Strategy and Budget Directorate, sets out a binding three-year macroeconomic and industrial framework that prioritises disinflation over near-term growth, targeting year-end CPI of 16% in 2026 narrowing to single digits by 2027–2028, while projecting GDP growth to accelerate from 3.3% in 2025 to 5.0% by 2028. Export revenues are targeted to rise from $273.8 billion in 2025 to $308.5 billion in 2028, with tourism receipts reaching $75 billion, and the central government deficit set to narrow from 3.6% to 2.8% of GDP. The programme is structured around three transformation pillars — green transformation, digital transition toward high-value-added industries, and alignment with Turkey's 12th National Development Plan (2024-2028) — making it the umbrella strategic framework within which sectoral instruments such as HIT-30, YEKA, and the 2026 import-regime decree operate.

Spain's Council of Ministers approved Royal Decree 768/2025 (published in BOE no. 212, 3 September 2025), establishing the regulatory basis for a direct state loan of up to EUR 1,011,850,000 to Hisdesat Servicios Estratégicos SA to develop the PAZ 2 radar Earth-observation satellite program (two SAR satellites plus ground segment), replacing the PAZ 1 satellite whose service life ends around 2030-2031. The program runs 2025-2032 and is designed to maintain Ministry of Defence access to synthetic-aperture-radar imagery for national-security purposes, with Hisdesat providing observation capacity to the Ministry of Defence for an initial 10-year period per satellite once operational.

South Korea's National Assembly passed an amendment to the Korea Development Bank (KDB) Act on 2025-08-27 (428th session, 3rd plenary sitting, 164-1 with 164 votes in favour of 165 cast), raising KDB's statutory capital ceiling from KRW 30 trillion to KRW 45 trillion and creating a new "Advanced Strategic Industry Fund" inside KDB. The fund is capitalised at KRW 50 trillion or more over five years via low-rate government-guaranteed bonds and is earmarked for the ten officially designated advanced strategic industries (AI, semiconductors, bio/vaccines, defense, robotics, hydrogen, secondary batteries, displays, future mobility) via cheap loans and equity investment. KDB intends to use the fund as seed capital for a wider "National Growth Fund" that blends in private and pension capital to reach KRW 100 trillion+ in total strategic-industry financing over five years.

On 22 August 2025 South Korea's National R&D Program Evaluation Steering Committee, convened by MOTIE, finalized an exemption from the mandatory preliminary feasibility study (예비타당성조사 면제) for the "K-On-Device AI Semiconductor Technology Development" project, clearing the roughly KRW 689.15 billion (approx. USD 496 million) program to proceed toward FY2026 budget allocation without the standard multi-year vetting delay. The project funds full-stack development — custom AI chip design, software, and modules — across four demand-anchored industries: automotive (Hyundai Motor), IoT/home appliances (LG Electronics), machinery/robotics (Doosan Robotics, Daedong), and defense (Korea Aerospace Industries). MOTIE structured the program so end-user demand companies participated directly in project planning, pairing them with domestic fabless design and foundry manufacturing firms to build a domestic on-device AI semiconductor ecosystem, ahead of full budget confirmation and formal program launch.

Parliament of India passed the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2025 (Act No. 28 of 2025) — Lok Sabha on 12 August 2025, Rajya Sabha on 19 August 2025, Presidential assent on 21 August 2025, in force 1 September 2025 — amending the parent MMDR Act, 1957. The Act removes the prior 50% cap on captive-mine production eligible for open sale (allowing captive-block holders unrestricted third-party sale after meeting end-use requirements), widens the National Mineral Exploration Trust into the National Mineral Exploration and Development Trust (NMEDT) with mandate extended to mine development, offshore areas, and overseas acquisition operations, raises the NMEDT royalty contribution from 2% to 3%, waives the auction premium for the 24 critical and strategic minerals listed in Part D of the First Schedule (including lithium, cobalt, graphite, nickel, REE, PGM, beryllium, and antimony), and establishes a statutory authority to register and regulate Mineral Exchanges as electronic commodity-trading platforms for minerals and metals.

Act L of 2025 (2025. évi L. törvény) is the Hungarian National Assembly statute that elevates a set of war-emergency government decrees — including the foreign-investment screening regime previously embedded in Government Decree 561/2022 — to permanent statutory level. Promulgated in Magyar Közlöny and entered into force on 19 August 2025, the Act preserves Hungary's "Second Regime" of FDI screening operating in parallel with the General Regime (which implements EU Reg 2019/452 since 2019). The Second Regime applies to a broad set of strategic sectors — energy, transport, communications, telecoms, pharmaceuticals, food processing, defence, financial services and healthcare — and requires approval from the Minister of National Economy for qualifying acquisitions (direct or indirect majority, ≥5% interest, ≥3% in listed companies, or ownership/operation of strategic infrastructure) where transaction value reaches HUF 350 million (~EUR 890,000). Notification is due within 10 days of signing; the MoE originally had 30 business days (extendable +15 calendar days). The Act also entrenches the Hungarian state right of first refusal on photovoltaic generation companies (NACE 35.11'08, excluding sub-50 kVA household installations), exercised through MNV Zrt. The Special Regime is structurally distinct from the General Regime and represents Hungary's peer to the German AWG §§55-62, French Décret 2014-479, Dutch Wet Vifo, and Italian Golden Power. Amended by Act XCIII of 2025 (in force 17 December 2025), which extended the MoE screening deadline to 45 business days and excluded bank-financing security arrangements from notification.

On 16 August 2025, Ukraine's President signed Decree No. 599/2025, enacting an NSDC decision "On the Application of Personal Special Economic and Other Restrictive Measures (Sanctions)" against 39 individuals and 55 legal entities identified as involved in developing, manufacturing, or supplying components for Russian unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with artificial-intelligence elements. The list covers 43 Russian entities (including drone makers Prognatik, Rozumni Ptakhy, Zala Aero, and KB Vostok, plus AI research centres Neurolab and TsBST), 10 Chinese suppliers of navigation receivers, engines, cameras, and microchips (including Dongguan Standard Trading, Zhejiang Lianxing Machinery, Shenzhen Sky Bow Navigation Technology, and Topscom Precision Industry), and 2 Belarusian component suppliers. Sanctions impose asset freezes and restrictions on commercial transactions and investment instruments, entered into force immediately upon signature and revocable no later than 15 August 2035.

On 11 August 2025, the President of Russia signed Decree No. 551, "On the Peculiarities of Procurement of Clothing and Equipment for the Needs of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation." From 1 January 2026, uniforms and equipment supplied to the Russian Armed Forces must be produced by Russian organisations with production facilities located on Russian territory; from 1 January 2027 the localisation requirement extends upstream to the fabrics and knitwear inputs themselves, which must also be Russian-made. The measure bars procurement of foreign-made military uniforms and effectively excludes non-Russian apparel manufacturers and textile suppliers from this segment of state defence procurement.

On 12 August 2025 Switzerland amended the Ordinance on Measures against Belarus (SR 946.231.116.9) — published as AS 2025 495 — adding eight Belarusian companies active in the arms industry to the frozen-funds list. Under the ordinance, funds and economic resources belonging to listed entities are frozen within Switzerland and making resources available to them is prohibited. The listing was adopted the same day Switzerland moved an interim tranche of EU 18th-package Russia measures into force via a parallel ordinance (AS 2025 497), aligning Swiss Belarus sanctions with the broader EU sanctions architecture targeting Russia's war effort and its Belarusian military-industrial suppliers.

On 8 August 2025, Ukraine's President signed Decree No. 595/2025, enacting an NSDC decision "On the Application of Personal Special Economic and Other Restrictive Measures (Sanctions)" against Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom and its international corporate network. Sanctions were applied to 18 individuals and 17 legal entities identified as involved in attempts to integrate the occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant into Russia's grid, participation in the seizure of the Chornobyl NPP, production and servicing of dual-use nuclear equipment, and export of enriched uranium through Rosatom subsidiaries registered in Switzerland, Cyprus, the Netherlands, and Finland. Named entities include Uranium One Holding N.V. (Netherlands), Rosatom Finance Ltd (Cyprus), and JSC Kirov-Energomash (Russia).

On 31 July 2025 the Slovenian government (under PM Robert Golob) adopted a decision, based on Article 28 of the Regulation on Approvals for Production and Permits for Trade in Military Weapons and Equipment, banning the export and transit of military weapons and equipment from or through Slovenia to Israel, and the import of such equipment from Israel, citing serious violations of international humanitarian law in Gaza. The ban covers items on the EU Common Military List and carves out an exception for equipment necessary for Slovenia's own security and resilience. Slovenia was the first EU/European country to enact such a measure. On 11 June 2026 the successor government under PM Janez Janša revoked the ban, arguing weapons-export conditions are already covered by the Defence Act and that no transit permits to/from Israel had been issued since 2023, and citing a wish to restore normal diplomatic channels with Israel.

India's Ministry of Defence signed a contract with Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) on 25 July 2025 for the procurement of Air Defence Fire Control Radars for the Indian Army, worth approximately Rs 2,000 crore (~USD 240 million), under the Buy (Indian-Indigenously Designed Developed and Manufactured) category. The radars, designed by DRDO and manufactured by BEL, carry a minimum 70% indigenous-content requirement and are intended to detect airborne threats including fighter aircraft, attack helicopters, and drones. Global Trade Alert separately logged the award as a public-procurement localisation measure affecting foreign radar suppliers to Czechia, Denmark, and Israel.

Poland's Sejm adopted on 25 July 2025 — and the President signed on 5 August 2025 (Dz.U. 2025 poz. 1080, in force 7 September 2025) — a Special Act on Strategic Investments in the Field of National Defence and Public Security that creates an accelerated authorisation track for defence and public- security infrastructure projects: a single combined administrative decision issued within 90 days of application, simplified notification regime inside closed military zones, replacement of full environmental and water-law assessments with targeted mitigation, and an exemption from the Public Procurement Law for Ministry-of-National-Defence-cleared unmanned aerial vehicles, unmanned weapon platforms and counter-drone systems. The statute is the procedural backbone for Poland's PLN 187bn 2025 defence budget (≈4.7% of GDP, the highest share in NATO) and dovetails with Poland's €43.7bn EU SAFE defence-loan allocation signed in May 2026.

On 18 July 2025 the Council of the European Union adopted Council Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/1469, implementing Article 8a(1) of Regulation (EC) No 765/2006, adding eight Belarusian entities to the Annex I asset-freeze list for supporting Belarus's military-industrial complex. The listed entities — State-owned Foreign Trade Unitary Enterprise Belvneshpromservice, OKB TSP Scientific Production LLC, KB Unmanned Helicopters (UAVHeli), Legmash Plant OJSC, Research and Production Unitary Enterprise "Scientific and Technical Center 'LEMT' BelOMO", Laser Devices and Technologies LLC, JSC Vistan, and Rukhservomotor LLC — span defence-export trading, artillery-shell and MLRS-rocket manufacture, unmanned military aircraft, optical weapon sights, and dual-use CNC machine tools supplied to Russian defence-related enterprises. Funds and economic resources belonging to the listed entities are frozen within the EU and the EU prohibition on making resources available to them applies with effect from 19 July 2025 (date of publication in the Official Journal). The listing was adopted the same day as the EU's 18th Russia sanctions package, as a parallel complementary measure under the separate Belarus sanctions regime.

On 18 July 2025, the Council of the European Union adopted the 18th package of restrictive measures against Russia, anchored by Council Regulation (EU) 2025/1494 amending Regulation 833/2014 (sectoral measures), Council Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/1476 implementing Regulation 269/2014 (asset-freeze listings), Council Decision (CFSP) 2025/1495 (vessel listings), and Council Regulation (EU) 2025/1472 (parallel Belarus measures). The package is the largest energy-sector escalation since 2022 and pivots from new-perimeter creation toward enforcement and circumvention closure. Headline measures: (i) the Russian-crude price cap is lowered from USD 60 to USD 47.6 per barrel with a new automatic dynamic mechanism re-indexing the cap to global oil prices every six months at a 15 % discount to the 22-week trailing average (effective 3 Sep 2025, with a transitional exemption to 18 Oct 2025 for pre-20 Jul 2025 contracts compliant with the prior cap); (ii) full transaction ban extended to 22 additional Russian banks, bringing the total cut off from the EU financial system to 45; transaction ban extended to third-country financial institutions and crypto-asset service providers facilitating circumvention; (iii) full transaction ban on Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines; (iv) import ban on refined oil products derived from Russian crude processed in third countries; (v) 105 additional vessels added to the shadow-fleet port-access ban (cumulative total 444); (vi) 26 new entities added to Annex IV military end-user list (15 Russian + 11 from China/Hong Kong/Turkey); (vii) Council Implementing Regulation 2025/1476 lists 14 individuals + 41 entities under asset-freeze, including a major Indian refinery (Nayara Energy, part-owned by Rosneft), three Chinese suppliers of battlefield goods, shadow-fleet operators, and entities involved in the deportation of Ukrainian children; (viii) parallel Belarus complementary measures via Regulation 2025/1472. Wind-down periods vary: 90 days for oil-price-cap contracts; banking-software wind-down to 30 Sep 2025; trade-goods wind-downs Oct 2025–Jan 2026 by category. Entry into force on 19 July 2025 (day following publication in the Official Journal), except for measures with explicit deferred application dates.

The European Investment Bank signed a EUR 385 million financing agreement with Spanish technology group Indra on 15 July 2025 to fund research, development and innovation in defence and space technologies — radar, electronic defence, electro-optics, command-and-control communications and advanced digitalisation. The financing backs construction of the Indra Technology Hub, an integrated R&D and advanced-manufacturing centre in Torrejón de Ardoz (Madrid region), and covers Indra's planned 2025-2028 capital and operating expenditure in Spain. The EIB describes it as its largest financing agreement in Spain to date and part of a EUR 3.5 billion (3.5% of 2025 Group financing) EIB allocation to European security and defence capability-building. Global Trade Alert separately logged the transaction as a "red"-flagged state-linked lending-support intervention.

On 14 July 2025, Public Services and Procurement Canada implemented the Interim Policy on Reciprocal Procurement, covering all new non-defence federal procurements valued at CAD 10,000 or above. Suppliers from countries that have no government- procurement trade obligations with Canada lose access to the federal procurement market; suppliers from countries with a relevant trade agreement retain access only to the extent their agreement provides. Procurements where at least 51% of estimated value is Defence Goods or Defence Services are excluded. Existing Supply Arrangements are grandfathered until their next renewal, with a hard deadline of 14 July 2026 for all such arrangements to comply. The policy was announced as a response to trading partners — chiefly the United States — that do not offer Canadian suppliers reciprocal access to their own procurement markets.

The Assembly of Albania (Kuvendi i Republikës së Shqipërisë) adopted Law No. 56/2025 on 11 July 2025, published in Fletorja Zyrtare (Official Gazette) No. 124 of the same date, amending Article 10 of Law No. 7764/1993 "On Foreign Investments" to introduce Albania's first-ever mandatory FDI screening mechanism. The law requires investors to submit applications for screening of any foreign investment "related to or affecting critical public infrastructure, critical technologies, dual-use goods, supply of critical inputs, access to sensitive information, or media freedom" — categories aligned with EU Regulation 2019/452 — while delegating thresholds, timelines, and procedural safeguards to a forthcoming Decision of the Council of Ministers (DCM). Albania becomes the first country in the Western Balkans to establish an investment-screening regime aligned with EU Regulation 2019/452, opening a new issuer-country code (AL) on the IPTM register and anchoring a regional cluster that currently stands at RS=1, MK=0, BA=0, ME=0, XK=0.

China's Ministry of Commerce issued Announcement No. 35 of 2025 on 9 July 2025, adding 8 Taiwan-based entities to its Dual-Use Items Export Control List under the Export Control Law and the Regulations on Export Control of Dual-Use Items. The listed firms — spanning aerospace/aviation, unmanned systems, and shipbuilding — are barred from receiving dual-use item exports from China; ongoing export activity to them must cease immediately, with exceptions only via case-by-case MOFCOM approval. The measure took effect the same day it was published.

The Polish Sejm passed the Act of 9 July 2025 amending the Act of 24 July 2015 on the Control of Certain Investments, signed by the President on 21 July 2025 and effective 24 July 2025. The amendment removes the time-limited "Specialised Rules" tier (introduced in 2020 under the Anti-COVID Shield) and makes Poland's FDI screening regime permanent. Review competence is transferred from the President of UOKiK (the competition authority) to the minister responsible for economic affairs (currently the Minister of Finance and Economy), and a new trigger covering "an international situation distorting the market or competition" is added alongside the existing public-order, security and health grounds.

On 8 July 2025 the European Commission adopted Communication COM(2025) 530 final, the "European Chemicals Industry Action Plan", together with companion staff-working document SWD(2025) 191. The Plan launches a Critical Chemicals Alliance (CCA) of Member States and industry stakeholders to safeguard EU production of strategic base chemicals (ammonia, urea, ethylene, propylene, methanol, chlorine, silicon and other high-volume building blocks) against capacity closures driven by structurally high energy/feedstock costs and third-country oversupply. The package combines (i) accelerated trade-defence on imports of PVC, melamine, glyoxylic acid, ethanolamines and polyols plus extension of the Combined Safeguard Mechanism into chemicals; (ii) energy-cost relief through swift implementation of the Affordable Energy Action Plan and an indirect-CBAM offset for chemicals exposed to high-energy input costs; (iii) a 6th Omnibus simplification package overhauling REACH, CLP labelling, cosmetics and fertilising-product rules with claimed industry savings of at least €363m/year; (iv) a framework for a follow-on Critical Chemicals Act and PFAS restrictions preserving critical applications. The chemicals sector covers ~29,000 EU companies, 1.2m direct jobs, and ~19m dependent supply-chain jobs.

India's Defence Acquisition Council (DAC), chaired by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, accorded Acceptance of Necessity (AoN) on 3 July 2025 for 10 capital acquisition proposals worth approximately ₹1.05 lakh crore (~USD 12.3 billion), routed exclusively through the Buy (Indian-IDDM) category, which mandates that the platform be designed, developed and manufactured indigenously by an Indian vendor. The cleared items span Armoured Recovery Vehicles, an Electronic Warfare System, an Integrated Common Inventory Management System for the Tri-Services, Surface-to-Air Missiles, Moored Mines, Mine Counter Measure Vessels, a Super Rapid Gun Mount and Submersible Autonomous Vessels. AoN is the formal first-stage approval that authorises the Ministry to proceed to RFP and vendor selection; it is not itself a signed contract.

On 25 June 2025 the European Commission adopted COM(2025) 335 final, a proposed Regulation establishing a single market for space activities — the first EU-level framework harmonising the authorisation, registration and supervision of space activities across Member States, replacing 13 fragmented national regimes. The Act rests on three pillars: safety (mandatory tracking of space objects, space- debris mitigation rules, an EU registry of space objects), resilience (cybersecurity requirements scaled to company size and risk profile) and sustainability (environmental impact assessment and active debris-removal R&D). It applies to both EU and non-EU operators providing space services in Europe, giving it extraterritorial reach over SpaceX/Starlink, Amazon Kuiper, OneWeb, Chinese SatNet/G60 and ISRO. The proposal is being negotiated under the ordinary legislative procedure; the Competitiveness Council of 9 December 2025 broadly endorsed its objectives, and the public consultation closed on 7 November 2025.

Government Decree 163/2025 (VI. 23.) amends the emergency-era Decree 561/2022 (XII. 23.) on economic-protection deviations, making two operative changes to Hungary's FDI screening regime: it extends the review period from 30 to up to 135 working days (45-day base plus three 30-workday extensions) and introduces a state pre-emption right, exercisable within 90 calendar days of a prohibition decision, allowing MNV Zrt. (Hungarian National Asset Management Company) or a designated entity to acquire the blocked target on the same terms as the original parties. The decree applies retroactively to all notification procedures pending at the time of entry into force (24 June 2025) and expands the screening scope from a solar-sector focus to broad strategic sectors. It served as an interim bridge — in force from 24 June to 18 August 2025 — until superseded by the permanent statutory codification in Act L of 2025.

The UK Department for Business and Trade, with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, published "The UK's Modern Industrial Strategy" (Command Paper CP 1451) on 23 June 2025, laid before Parliament via Written Statement HCWS725. It is the first cross-economy industrial strategy under the Starmer Labour government and replaces the 2017 Industrial Strategy (withdrawn in 2021). It sets a ten-year horizon focused on business investment, productivity and resilience, designates eight priority growth sectors ("IS-8"), and packages instruments including British Business Bank capacity expansion, the National Wealth Fund's GBP 27.8bn envelope, a permanent statutory Industrial Strategy Advisory Council, planning and skills reforms, and sector-specific Sector Plans published alongside.

The Chips Joint Undertaking, via Horizon Europe grant agreement 101213727 signed 19 June 2025, is co-funding "PIXEurope" (Advanced Photonic Integrated Circuits Pilot Line for Europe), the fifth EU Chips Act pilot line, coordinated by Fundació Institut de Ciències Fotòniques (ICFO, Spain) with a 19-entity, multi-country consortium. Total project cost is EUR 176.05m against EUR 88.03m in EU/Chips JU contribution, running 1 June 2025 to 31 May 2030. TNO (Netherlands) is a lead participant, receiving EUR 13.47m in net EU contribution (EUR 26.94m total eligible cost) to build a 6-inch indium-phosphide photonic-chip pilot manufacturing line at High Tech Campus Eindhoven — part of a wider EUR 193m Dutch national co-investment (Ministry of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Defence, Chips JU, TNO, TU Eindhoven, University of Twente) targeting technological independence in photonic chips for telecom/6G, AI, quantum, defence and medical-diagnostics applications. Global Trade Alert logs a EUR 10.1m figure for the TNO tranche as a "red" state-act intervention (financial grant) on competitive-distortion grounds; this filing anchors on the CORDIS-published grant-agreement figures as the authoritative primary-source numbers.

On 18 June 2025 the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the BPCE banking group signed a EUR 300 million loan agreement to expand financing available to French small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) active in the security and defence supply chain, delivered through BPCE's Banque Populaire and Caisse d'Epargne networks. It is the first such operation the EIB has signed in France, and the second in Europe, under the EIB's Pan-EU Security & Defence Lending Envelope, which was expanded from EUR 1 billion to EUR 3 billion earlier in 2025 (a first tranche was signed with Deutsche Bank in Germany the preceding week). Funds are earmarked for SMEs investing in cybersecurity, surveillance, resilience, and defence technologies.

On 11 June 2025 the European Investment Bank (EIB) and Deutsche Bank signed a EUR 500 million framework loan agreement, enabling roughly EUR 1 billion in on-lending to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the European security and defence supply chain, as well as military and police infrastructure such as training facilities. It is the first operation signed under the EIB's Pan-EU Security & Defence Lending Envelope, which was tripled from EUR 1 billion to EUR 3 billion around the same date, and was unveiled by EIB Group President Nadia Calviño at the European Defence and Security Summit in Brussels.