Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk called for drastically higher defence spending in the European Union in an address to the European Parliament on Wednesday.
“If Europe is to survive, it needs to be armed,” he told EU lawmakers gathered in Strasbourg, France.
He called on EU countries to spend 5% of gross domestic product (GDP) on defence.
“This is a time when Europe cannot afford to save on security,” said Tusk, whose country borders Russia’s ally Belarus, the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, and Ukraine.
According to Tusk, Poland already spends around 5% of GDP on defence.
There is no set defence spending goal in the EU. Of the 27 EU countries, 23 are also members of the Western defence alliance NATO.
NATO allies have pledged to spend at least 2% of economic output on defence, a target which might be increased at the next NATO summit in June.
US President Donald Trump is demanding NATO allies spend 5% on defence – a level that Washington does not meet. Germany has increased its expenditure to just over 2%.
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Publish date : 2025-01-22 06:56:00
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