Remarks by President António Costa ahead of the Informal EU leaders’ retreat

Good morning. Today, I have the pleasure of receiving the 27 EU leaders for an informal meeting. This is the first time that we meet for a meeting dedicated exclusively to defence. But we are not starting from scratch. Our effort is in the continuation of the work we started during the summit in Versailles in March 2022, when we decided that the EU needs to assume greater responsibility for its own defence.

My intention with this retreat is to have a frank, open and free discussion around three main issues:

What are the priorities we need to develop in a collaborative way?
How can we ensure the necessary financing?
How can we strengthen our existing partnerships?

I hope that this strategic discussion will provide the European Commission and the High Representative with our political guidance for the upcoming white paper on defence and pave the way for the decisions we will have to make in the coming months.

Today, we will also receive the NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, and the UK Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer.

I will be glad to talk to you later at the press conference this evening.