Mattarella at the Arraiolos summit: three challenges for Europe
Europe is facing ‘extraordinary challenges’ that cannot be tackled by individual countries; a European dimension is therefore needed. The EU must be equipped with ‘more streamlined and faster decision-making procedures’. The negotiations on the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework are ‘crucial’ because they will not merely concern the allocation of resources but also a vision for the future
by Lina Palmerini
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Key points
He was the first to speak at the Arraiolos summit in Slovenia. “The most senior and most respected,” as Slovenia’s President Pirc Musar described him, and it was partly for this reason that Mattarella’s words were heeded and – above all – endorsed. There were three key points which, although he has been repeating them for some time, take on even greater significance in the light of the European Council.
More EU: acting alone is self-defeating
Firstly: Europe is facing ‘extraordinary challenges’ that cannot be tackled by individual countries; a European dimension is therefore required. To think we can go it alone – says the Head of State – would be ‘an escape from reality, an act of self-harm’.
Europe: more streamlined decision-making
Secondly: in this context, the EU needs to be equipped ‘with more streamlined and rapid decision-making procedures. Without swift decision-making, these issues in international affairs would be decided by other actors, and Europe would be left to bear the consequences of their choices’.
Crucial decisions on the financial framework
Thirdly: the negotiations on the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework are ‘crucial’ because they will not merely concern the allocation of resources but will also shape our vision for the future and, therefore, the ‘level of ambition with which Europe intends to tackle the transformations currently underway. I hope it will be sufficiently ambitious’.
EU defence: the showdown with Putin
Naturally, he returns to the subject of common defence, a topic that has been on the table not just for some time but ever since Putin decided to invade Ukraine and – even more so – following Trump’s gradual disengagement from the Russia-Ukraine conflict. And this is also why he says that ‘there is no need for many words regarding the necessity of a common defence and the interoperability of our military assets, both because it is an indispensable condition for a common defence and to strengthen NATO on the European front, in order to restore the balance in relation to Russia’s stance’. Balance, he adds, is ‘a guarantee of peace, thwarting any temptation towards aggression’. He then insists, as he has done for some time, on the issue of enlargement to include the Western Balkan countries, Ukraine and Moldova; however, he points out, ‘a Union with well over thirty members could not function under the current decision-making procedures’.
