More than half of all EU countries intend to use an exemption allowing them to exceed budgetary limits in order to stimulate military spending, the Bloc council said.
The European Commission proposed earlier this year that members could use an emergency clause to spend up to 1.5% of their GDP on defense investments over the next four years without breaking the rules on public deficits and debt.
This decision was made after the Trump administration suggested that Europe should pay more to defend itself – and in the midst of security problems concerning the Russian war in Ukraine.
Germany and Poland direct the group of countries that said they wanted to do so, the EU said in a statement on Wednesday.
Hungary and Slovakia – whose governments are considered to be adapted to Moscow – are also listed. The rest of the EU member states which have decided to request the activation of the so-called escape clause include Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Greece, Portugal, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Croatia and Bulgaria, said the European Council.
“We remain open to new exemption requests,” added the economic commissioner of EU Valdis Dombrovskis.
The clause could allow hundreds of billions of euros to be spent to rearm the continent by 2030.
Although military expenditure has increased by 31% within the EU since 2021, many Member States wish to further increase defense expenses.
The German chancellor entering Friedrich Merz said that Europe should act quickly for its security.
“Given the threats of our freedom and our peace on our continent, the rule for our defense must now be” anything “,” he said in March.
Announces an EU defense package in March, the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has clearly talked about the dangers in which Europe has found itself.
“We are at a time of reset. And Europe is ready to massively increase its defense expenses, “she said.
“Both to respond to the short -term urgency to act and support Ukraine, but also to meet the long -term need to assume much more responsibility for our own European security.”
