Topics included promoting digitalisation, decarbonisation and European defense capabilities.
On Friday, the leaders of the 26 member countries of the European Union will meet in Budapest’s Puskás Arena at an informal summit of the European Council. The Slovak Republic is represented at the meeting by Prime Minister Robert Fico. They will mainly discuss the strengthening of the competitiveness of the Union, informs the correspondent of TASR in Budapest.
After arriving in Budapest on Thursday, the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, highlighted to journalists three main topics that the EU leaders will deal with on Friday.
Major topics also included overcoming common addictions and increasing defensive capabilities
“The first is a joint plan to promote competitiveness, digitization and decarbonization. The second is to overcome our common dependencies and to create a level playing field for our economy and businesses,” said the President of the EC.
She specified that these topics will be discussed on the basis of the report on European competitiveness prepared by the former president of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi.
According to her, the third topic is the increase of European defense capabilities and defense investments, as well as the strengthening of preparedness. In this case, the report of the former Finnish Prime Minister Sauli Niinistö should be the basis for the discussion.
“The future of Europe is in our hands, we must act now,” emphasized von der Leyen.
The summit is organized by Hungary, which took over the rotating six-monthly presidency of the Council of the EU on July 1. The summit of the European Political Community (EPC) was also held in Budapest on Thursday with the participation of 42 heads of state and government, as well as the leaders of the EU, NATO and representatives of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
