Germany’s new Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Wednesday said Berlin supports relaxing the EU’s strict fiscal rules to allow member states to significantly ramp up defence spending, as he sought to establish his European credentials during his first foreign visits.
Just a day after narrowly securing enough parliamentary votes to take office, Merz travelled to France and Poland in a high-profile start to a term dominated by the war in Ukraine, transatlantic tensions, and domestic unease over the far right.
In Paris, he said he and French President Emmanuel Macron had “agreed a new start for Europe”, though details remained scarce.
Berlin calls for new defence exception to EU rules
Speaking in Warsaw alongside Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Merz pointed to Germany’s recent move to exempt military spending from its national debt brake. He said something similar should apply to the EU’s broader fiscal framework.
“We could imagine something similar for the European fiscal pact or fiscal rules,” he said.
Sixteen EU countries – including Germany – have already signalled interest in using new exemptions that allow up to 1.5 percent of GDP to be spent on defence for four years. The EU can suspend its rules in exceptional circumstances, as it did during the Covid-19 crisis.
Merz said Europe needed to “produce more” of its own military equipment and harmonise weapons systems, stating: “We must make sure the European members of NATO, and the whole European Union, are able to defend themselves on a long-term basis.”
Border controls and EU cohesion also on agenda
Polish Prime Minister Tusk praised Merz for what he called a “new opening” in German-Polish relations, and stressed the need to strengthen the EU’s external borders to preserve internal freedom of movement.
The Merz government, under pressure from the far right, also announced plans this week to expand pushbacks of asylum seekers at Germany’s borders – a move that could test EU cohesion.
Tusk, echoing past frictions over migration policy, said it was “in the interest of Germany and Poland” to maintain open internal borders and focus instead on securing the EU’s external frontier.
On Friday, France and Poland are expected to sign a new friendship pact including security cooperation – a signal of broader European efforts to deepen coordination amid geopolitical uncertainty.
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