The European Parliament Approved the Creation of European Defence Fund

The future European Defence Fund is designed to strengthen EU's strategic autonomy and technological leadership in defence. For this purpose MEPs recommend to allocate €13 billion. On April 18 the European Parliament endorsed the provisional agreement reached by the co-legislators on the future European Defence Fund. 328 MEPs supported this initiative, 231 MEPs opposed, and 19 abstentions. The future Fund should attract innovations in the defense industry, in particular to promote the development of new weapons systems. For this purpose MEPs recommend to allocate €13 billion. The final amount will be discussed during the negotiations on the long-term budget of the European Union for 2021 – 2027. Members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany Martina Werner and Arne Lietz are among the critics of the initiative. According to Werner, a wiser move would be the gradual integration of national defense systems into the association at the level of the European Union. Subsidizing the defense industry, the MEP called “the wrong way”. In turn, Lietz stressed that the new fund means “gifts for the defense industry” and there will not be any savings. Merkel and the CDU leader supported the project to create a European aircraft carrier. In March, the Chairman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said that Germany and France are working together on a project of military aircraft, and all the rest countries are invited. The next step is the creation of a joint aircraft carrier, which will mean European Union key role in security and peace, stressed the Chairman of the CDU. Later, German Chancellor Angela Merkel backed plan for EU aircraft carrier. DW