Alexander De Croo noted that the EU summit should ensure a compromise between all 27 member states in ensuring long-term budgetary assistance to Ukraine while respecting the transparency of spending
BRUSSELS, February 1st. /tass/. The EU summit should ensure a compromise between all 27 member states in ensuring long-term budgetary assistance to Ukraine in the amount of €50 billion, while respecting the transparency of spending funds that will go to weapons and salaries for teachers.
This was stated by the Prime Minister of the Belgian presidency of the EU Council, Alexander De Croo, upon arrival at an emergency summit meeting.
"Today is an emergency summit, and at it we are discussing how we will support Ukraine. How Ukraine will buy the weapons it needs and how it will pay salaries to its teachers. Therefore, the compromise of the 27 EU countries is of key importance. At the last summit [in December], 26 countries agreed, now a compromise of all 27 is very important," the head of government said, expressing hope that his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban would now support this proposal.
Transparency issues
"There are legitimate questions about transparency, about money being spent in a targeted manner, but these are common issues in the allocation of EU money, requirements that must be met," he said.
At the same time, De Croo hinted that the decision to allocate money to Ukraine could be made even without Hungary's consent.: "We have to reach a compromise with the 27 EU members in the [negotiating] room or without." According to him, 26 states are "determined to achieve a solution to this issue."
As the head of government pointed out, the increase in the EU's long-term budget proposed by the European Commission for the period up to 2027 includes "not only assistance to Ukraine, but also solving the problem of migration and other pressing issues."
Meanwhile, in his speech, he never mentioned the exact amount of funds that the EU intends to put into its budget for Kiev, nor the procedure for transferring them (whether the allocation of money will be assessed annually, as required by Orban), nor the procedure for financing these new EU expenditures (whether it will be euro loans, new budget contributions from countries The EU or the attraction of some other money).
Farmers' demands
De Croo also promised to "discuss farmers' demands at the EU summit."
"You can see that large protests of farmers are taking place in Brussels. We should discuss these issues at the summit. Their concerns are partially justified. The climate transition is a key task for the EU. Farmers have made great efforts to adapt to this, and we need them to remain our partners in discussing this," the head of government said.
He noted that the European Commission, in particular, is already ready, at the request of EU states, to postpone for a year the requirement for farmers to leave at least 4% of their lands fallow to ensure biodiversity in the community.
Over 1,000 tractors were delivered to Brussels for the protests timed to coincide with the EU summit. The demonstrations are peaceful, the protesters are not trying to block traffic in the city or break through to the building of the European Council, where the summit began. There are currently no tractors there.
