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Italy’s Meloni supports PM Orbán’s call for peace
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Europe must recognise its own limits and give member states the tools to act independently, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said in Budapest on Friday, ahead of an informal meeting of European Union heads of state and government.
Meloni supports PM Orbán’s call for peace
Although “many pretend that certain debates were just surfacing”, the issue of comptetitiveness had been on the agenda since Hungary published its programme for the presidency, as the US measures to protect their economy required an answer, she said.
“We must ask not what America can do for us but what Europe can do for itself,” she said, according to a statement from the Italian prime minister’s office.
The main focus is on the distribution of funds, “and whether we really want to give tools to member states to achieve their strategic goals.” Member states should have more independence in the matter of defence, too, she said.
She said she supported Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s call for peace in Ukraine, but said that “as long as the war lasts, Rome will stand by Ukraine.”
Michel calls for joint efforts to improve EU competitiveness
In the past months, the European Union has come to a concensus on cooperation to make the community more competitive both within the EU and with third partners, European Council President Charles Michel said in Budapest on Friday, ahead of an informal EU summit.
Michel said the Draghi Report, with its clear recommendations, was an excellent basis for discussion.
Answering a question, Michel said the recent US election had left the burning issues of climate change open, adding that the recent floods in Spain had pointed to the EU’s obligation to react fast in such situations.
Concerning the recent elections in Georgia, Michel raised a serious suspicion of fraud and said the process should be investigated.
‘Let’s protect our common European interests!’, Macron said
French President Emmanuel Macron, at a plenary session of the European Political Community’s summit held in Budapest on Thursday, called for a common approach to protecting European interests, saying that Europe “must write its own history”.
Macron said that a turning point had been reached in European history.
In connection with “the war started by Vladimir Putin” and technological advances taken by China, Macron said the question was whether Europe wanted “to read history written by others or write its own”.