Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy will address a summit of EU leaders on Thursday and brief them on his telephone call with Donald Trump about the US president’s call a day earlier with Vladimir Putin.
The EU leaders will commit to do more to make the bloc more competitive with more military muscle in the face of US tariffs and other economic challenges, and doubts over Washington’s future backing in defence.
All leaders, except Hungary’s Viktor Orban, are expected to reaffirm their financial and military support to Mr Zelenskiy, whose video-link address will start the summit.
The 26 EU leaders are expected to agree a text which commits to uphold Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity and urges Russia to “show real political will to end the war”.
The summit comes two days after the Russian president agreed to Mr Trump’s proposal for Russia and Ukraine to pause attacking each other’s energy infrastructure, but stopped short of accepting a blanket 30-day truce.
EU leaders will debate European Commission proposals to boost military spending, pool resources on joint defence projects and buy more European arms.
France is the leading backer of a buy-European approach. However, one EU diplomat stressed it made no sense to try to cut out non-EU suppliers in a globally interconnected defence industry.
The leaders will also address concerns that the EU will fall behind the United States and others in the global tech race without rapid decisions and massive investment.
On competitiveness, there is broad consensus on the goals, but discord on certain key details.
The draft conclusions of the summit set multiple deadlines for progress in three areas – cutting red tape, energy security and climate neutrality and getting consumers to invest in the real economy rather than parking their money with a bank.
The latter is part of a planned integration of fragmented financial markets, known as the capital markets union, which has been debated for a decade.
Trade frictions with the United States are not officially part of the agenda, but are likely to surface in discussions held just a week after Mr Trump imposed tariffs on steel and aluminium.
That prompted EU retaliation, Mr Trump’s threat to hit EU wine and spirits with 200 per cent tariffs and warnings he could announce more tariffs in early April. – Reuters
