“The urgency is there”, it’s necessary “getting out of Europe’s dependence on Russian gas as quickly as possible”, “not in 2027 but from the end of this year”, declares Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market, in charge of Defense within the European Commission, invited Monday, March 14 by France Inter. According to him, “the key to this tragedy that we are living at the gates of Europe is really the united European response” and “the 27 are united”.
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“In the energy mix of all of Europe, Russian gas accounts for 9.2%”he adds, recalling that the commitment made by the European Council at the Versailles summit, and asked the European Commission, “it’s to come back in 15 days with a plan to be only 3% dependent at the end of this year”. “It’s still huge”he believes. “For the remaining 3%, the President of the Republic said that nothing was taboo. We must therefore see if we can speed up and find the measures, but there will be ways and means to do so”, specifies Thierry Breton.
For the European Commissioner, “we are not at the end of this logic of the worst with Vladimir Putin”. “Unfortunately, in his logic the worst is not certain but it is probable, so you have to constantly anticipate”underlines Thierry Breton, evoking – in addition to the economic sanctions – the coordinated responses of Europe in terms of defense. “The Commission has been asked to come back with a total pooling plan, for the month of May, in order to buy in common”in this area, he says.
“All European countries are now going to increase their defense expenditure from 1.5% to 2% in relation to GDP” which, according to Thierry Breton, will allow “raise our defense spending compared to what it is today, by 65 to 70 billion euros more per year”. “We must ensure that we use these sums to increase our investments in Europe and not to buy abroad, so that Europe becomes more autonomous in terms of defence”he adds.