EU leaders to stress defence, economic strength amid growing uncertainty

BRUSSELS: European Union leaders will commit on Thursday to do more to make the bloc more competitive with more military muscle in the face of U.S. tariffs and other economic challenges, and doubts over Washington’s future backing in defence.

All leaders, except Hungary’s Viktor Orban, are also expected to re-affirm their financial and military support to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiyy, 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 Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to US President Donald 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.

“So those who say that we should cut out the non-Europeans are shooting themselves geopolitically and economically in the foot,” the diplomat said.

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.

One issue raised by many EU diplomats on Wednesday was whether supervision should be centralised, as some larger countries want and smaller countries oppose.

Zelenskiy says he had substantive call with Trump discussing partial ceasefire, air defences

“We are determined to make progress,” said one EU diplomat. “But let’s not pretend that it’s easy.”

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 Trump imposed tariffs on steel and aluminium.

That prompted EU retaliation, Trump’s threat to hit EU wine and spirits with 200% tariffs and warnings he could announce more tariffs in early April.