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Great Britain will join this week the EU leaders in revolutionary talks to set up defense financing provisions on the scale of Europe, while the continent has trouble strengthening its soldiers at Middle of fears of missing American security coverage.
The British Chancellor Rachel Reeves will take talks with other European finance ministers at a G20 meeting in CAP this week, while the war in Ukraine between her fourth year.
“It could be a fund or a bank. For example, there is the concept of the rearmament bank, which we also consider, “said Polish Minister of Finance Andrzej Domanski.
Domanski told Financial Times that discussions had taken place with the United Kingdom for months, adding: “Without Britain, the defense of Europe is difficult to imagine.”
The British Treasury confirmed that Reeves “would increase defense financing proposals with its European counterparts” in the G20, but that the talks were at an early stage.
Donald Trump has asked NATO European Allies to increase defense spending to 5% of GDP, by 2% existing that some do not reach or risk losing American protection.
The rapid re -engagement of the American president with Russia, a country that most European countries consider an existential threat, has sparked frantic discussions on how to collectively strengthen the defensive capacities of Europe and reduce dependence on the regard for American troops and weapons.
Sunday, the new Chancellor of Germany, Friedrich Merz, said that Germany should fundamentally refuse its security agreements and put an end to a decade of decade in Washington, saying that Trump was “largely indifferent” to the fate of the Europe and the continent necessary to “achieve independence”.
Collective expenses of European defense were widely discussed during an appeal this weekend between the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and a separate call between Von der Leyen and the first Norwegian Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, according to a person informed of the discussions.
European countries are looking for means of increasing defense capacities at a time of closely limited national budgets. By taking advantage of national guarantees, a bank would allow countries to stimulate spending without increasing their balance sheets in advance.
The United Kingdom is looking for ways to increase defense expenses by 2.3% of GDP by 2.5%, which costs at least 5 billion pounds sterling per year, when its ability to increase expenses is highly limited by its self-imposed tax rules.
Among the proposals, one of General Sir Nick Carter, former leader of the British army, who suggested a “rearmament bank” to draw from the European savings pool, on the European Bank model for Reconstruction and development – The lender was implemented after the fall of the iron curtain to support central and eastern Europe.
“The treasure is interested in this,” said a person involved in discussions with the team of Reeves. However, the Treasury officials said there were many multilateral funding models on the table and that Reeves had an open mind in the next steps.
Experts said that a reeves’ advantage of Carter’s “resetting bank” was that he would reduce the impact of additional defense expenses on tax rules.
Andy King, a former British official who is now at Flint Global, a council, said that such a bank had the potential to raise “important resources for defense without having a significant impact on budgetary rules”. He added: “This is not a certain result: detail would import according to the structure of the entity and how it used its loan capacity.”
The meeting of EU leaders at the end of March will discuss common defense needs, and Poland’s objective would be to progress on financing needs during an EU finance minister in April, before a decision leaders in June.
The European Commission said that this month, it would partially increase the EU budgetary rules to allow countries to invest in the defense, a decision that would allow countries to borrow without sanctions.
Von Der Leyen has also opened the door to “common European funding” on common defense projects and should detail the financing options in March.
