Closing summary
… and on that note, it’s a wrap for today!
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has sent a letter to 27 heads of state and government outlining her ideas ahead of their Thursday informal meeting on the bloc’s competitiveness (17:08).
Earlier today, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, also urged Europe to reassert its position in the world, as the continent faces rapidly changing landscape in politics and trade (12:10).
These discussions are expected to continue at this Thursday’s informal EU summit in Belgium and then over the weekend as the Munich Security Conference in Germany, with senior US and Chinese politicians joining the discussion (13:37).
Curiously, US vice-president JD Vance – who dominated the headlines with his highly confrontational speech on Europe last year – is not attending the MSC this year (14:03).
But, during his visit to Armenia, Vance repeated his implied criticism of Denmark over Greenland, revealing that the talks over the territory’s future will continue “over the next few months” (14:40).
In other news,
Estonia’s foreign intelligence service has released its annual assessment of the global security situation this morning, with a heavy focus on the threat from its neighbour Russia (10:16).
The Kremlin said there was no date set yet for the next round of talks on Ukraine (10:35), after Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said there was still “a long way to go” in talks on Ukraine (10:04).
Romania’s foreign minister Oana Țoiu said Europe should “never be naive when it comes to Russia” and be “clear-eyed about the lessons that history has taught us” amid growing sabotage and cyber threats from Moscow (12:55).
And that’s all from me, Jakub Krupa, for today.
If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at [email protected].
I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.
EU's von der Leyen sets out her plans to improve bloc's competitiveness ahead of key summit
Meanwhile, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has sent a letter to 27 heads of state and government ahead of their Thursday informal meeting on the bloc’s competitiveness.
She is not the only one to have ideas as to what needs to be done, with a strong anti-bureaucracy alliance seemingly building between Germany’s Friedrich Merz and Italy’s Giorgia Meloni.
But in her eight page primer, von der Leyen hit similar tones to those from Macron’s interview earlier today (12:10), as she urged leaders to realise that “a competitive economy is a prerequisite for our freedom to chose our own destiny.”
She urged them to back the commission’s “unprecedented drive to simplify European legislation” to help “make the day-to-day operations of business easier” by streamlining the administrative processes.
She also called for “a comprehensive regulatory deep house cleaning” of the EU’s rulebook to “eliminate outdated provisions, inconsistencies and redundant procedural requirements.”
Von der Leyen also asked leaders to support the EU’s push to conclude new trade agreements around the world – despite the continuing controversies around its Mercosur deal, which prompted large protests in several member states.
She also said the EU needed to “deepen” its single market, removing internal barriers to help companies set up in one member states grow beyond the national borders and across the bloc.
Notably, the commission’s president also said that while the bloc’s ambition should be to “reach agreement among all 27 member states,” they should also insist on going ahead with this closer economic cooperation even if unanimity cannot be found – a clear signal to the likes of Hungary and Slovakia to not even try to block the talks.
During the summit on Thursday night, hosted at Alden Biesen castle in Belgium, the leaders will be joined by former Italian prime minister and former European Central Bank president Mario Draghi, who is seen as a leading voice calling for changes to EU economy, and another former Italian premier, Enrico Letta.
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