“The U.S. is preparing to intercept more ships transporting Venezuelan oil following the seizure of a tanker this week, as it increases pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro,” Reuters reports.

“The seizure has put shipowners, operators and maritime agencies involved in transporting Venezuelan crude on alert, with many reconsidering whether to sail from Venezuelan waters in the coming days as planned.”

“After the U.S. military seized a large crude oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast, President Donald Trump suggested the ship’s contents could remain in U.S. possession,” CNBC reports.

Said Trump: “Well, we keep it, I guess.”

“Denmark’s military intelligence service raised concerns for the first time about the United States in its annual threat assessment, saying in a report released Wednesday that shifts in American policy are generating new uncertainties for Denmark’s security,” the New York Times reports.

“The report points to the United States’ use of tariffs against allies and its intensified activity in the Arctic, and raises many of the same concerns that European leaders have voiced about the direction of President Trump’s America-first foreign policy.”

“Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky floated the prospect of putting the issue of territorial control in the country’s east to a referendum as Kyiv comes under mounting pressure to agree to terms of an emerging peace plan to end Russia’s war,” Bloomberg reports.

“Moscow has insisted that Ukraine withdraw its forces from the eastern Donbas, which includes areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that the Russian military has failed to capture in its nearly four-year invasion.”

“Zelenskiy has engaged in talks over the latest peace proposal from President Donald Trump’s administration, but has maintained his position that Ukraine won’t consider surrendering territory to the Kremlin.”

“They need to come to Congress and say what they’re doing. We don’t know what’s going on. Nobody knows what the mission is in Venezuela.”

— Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), quoted by Punchbowl News.

Venezuelan dissident and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado appeared in Oslo after a “journey in a situation of extreme danger” to reach the Norwegian capital from her place of hiding in Venezuela, Bloomberg reports.

Wall Street Journal: “The Venezuelan opposition leader was trying to get to Norway by Wednesday in time to receive the Nobel Peace Prize that she won for challenging Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro. First she had to get from the Caracas suburb where she has been in hiding for a year to a coastal fishing village, where a skiff awaited her.”

“Over the course of 10 nerve-racking hours, Machado and two people helping her escape hit 10 military checkpoints, avoiding capture each time, before she reached the coast by midnight.”

“U.S. forces have intercepted and seized a sanctioned oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, a move that marks a serious escalation of tensions between the two countries,” Bloomberg reports.

Jonathan Chait: “The buildup to a possible conflict with Venezuela, which has included attacks on boats and a gathering of forces in the Caribbean, is unusual, even surreal, in its lack of a coherent public rationale. Not only has the administration failed to seek authorization for continued operations from Congress—as the Constitution requires for any military action longer than 60 days—it is barely engaging in the kind of jingoistic rhetoric that usually prefigures a conflict.”

“The administration has doubled the reward for anything that might help lead to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s capture, but Trump hasn’t convincingly explained why.”

“Citizens of countries including the U.K. and France will have to disclose five years of their social-media history to visit the U.S., even though they are covered by a visa waiver program, under a proposal by the Trump administration,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

An apparent network of 73 TikTok accounts has been posting thousands of AI deepfakes of U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer supposedly announcing controversial policies, from exorbitant new taxes to chilling authoritarian measures, NewsGuard reports.

The network appears designed to push these fakes about Starmer and his Labour government to drive engagement for financial gain.

Donald Trump’s envoys have given Volodymyr Zelensky days to respond to a proposed peace deal requiring Ukraine to accept territorial losses in exchange for unspecified U.S. security guarantees, the Financial Times reports.

A person with knowledge of the timeline proposed to Kyiv said Trump was hoping for a deal agreed “by Christmas.”

“Congressional Republicans have largely expressed public support for the Trump administration’s strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea that the Defense Department claims are carrying narcotics to the United States, even as the tactic has come under withering criticism from Democrats,” the Washington Post reports.

“But President Donald Trump’s declaration last week that the U.S. could soon bomb Venezuelan territory has put lawmakers from the president’s party on edge and amplified concerns that Trump is preparing to use military force to oust Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro.”

“NATO calls me Daddy.”

— President Trump, quoted by Axios.

President Trump said there’s “no question” that Russia is in a stronger negotiating position than Ukraine and has the “upper hand” amid high-stakes discussions to end the years-long war, Axios reports.

Said Trump: “I give the people of Ukraine and the military of Ukraine tremendous credit for the, you know, bravery and for the fighting and all of that. But, you know, at some point, size will win generally.”

President Trump denounced Europe as a “decaying” group of nations led by “weak” people, Politico reports.

“The broadside attack against European political leadership represents the president’s most virulent denunciation to date of these Western democracies, threatening a decisive rupture with countries like France and Germany that already have deeply strained relations with the Trump administration.”

“The Honduran attorney general announced on Monday night that he had issued an international arrest warrant for the country’s former president Juan Orlando Hernández, who was recently pardoned by President Trump and released from prison in the United States,” the New York Times reports.

“Ukraine will not surrender territory, President Volodymyr Zelensky declared on Monday, rejecting a central Russian demand that President Donald Trump had incorporated into his latest proposal to end the Kremlin’s war,” the Washington Post reports.

“The unequivocal declaration that Ukraine would not surrender land could mark the collapse of Trump’s latest plan to end the war, which critics condemned as fulfilling a wish list of Russian President Vladimir Putin.”