EU leaders are meeting to try to approve the Budapest Declaration, focused on “significant investments, mobilization of public and private financing” and an “integrated energy market.”
European Union (EU) leaders meet this Friday at an informal European Council in Budapest to discuss a new European agreement on competitiveness, which highlights the need for “significant investments” against the United States and China.
Gathered in the Hungarian capital for the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU that Hungary assumes, the heads of Government and State of the Union, including the Portuguese Prime Minister, Luís Montenegro, will try to approve the Budapest Declaration, in which “significant investments are defended, mobilizing public and private financing”, as well as a “fully integrated and interconnected energy market, as a priority”, according to the draft to which the Lusa agency had access.
The meeting takes place in a context of political changes in the United States, after the election of Donald Trump on Tuesday the 47th president of the United States, when it is accepted that the Republican will focus more on North American interests, raising fears about the impact on transatlantic relations between Brussels and Washington.
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The high-level meeting comes after former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi listed, in a report released in September, failures in community investment and delays in industrial, technological and defense terms, a situation that the EU now wants to reverse. , at this time of political change in the United States, one of its main partners and competitors.
Mario Draghi will be present in Budapest, after estimating the annual need for additional investments in the community at 800 billion euros, equivalent to more than 4% of the GDP (gross domestic product) of the community, double what was made after the Second World War throughout the world with the Marshall Plan—, within the framework of a new community industrial strategy.
In the document, the former Italian ruler also defended a regular issuance of common debt in the EU, as happened after the covid-19 pandemic, and a large investment in Defense.
Former Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta proposed, in another report published in April, joint debt with clear payment plans, loans on favorable conditions and support from the European Investment Bank to finance EU investments in Security and Defense.
In the letter of invitation now sent by the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, to the EU leaders on the occasion of the informal summit, the Belgian official denounces a “very worrying situation” of community competitiveness, since, “Over the last 20 years, the EU’s share of global GDP has halved.”
“We have to act now, […] “The competitive survival of the Union is at stake.”he urged.
This will be the last European Council with Charles Michel at the head of the institution, a position that the former Portuguese Prime Minister, António Costa, will assume as of December 1.
Source: Observadora
