UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called for stronger European coordination on defence and security during the opening plenary of the 8th European Political Community (EPC) summit in Yerevan, Armenia.
Speaking alongside European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni during a panel hosted by Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides, Starmer said: “We cannot deny that some of the alliances that we have come to rely on are not in the place we would want them to be”.
He added that “there needs to be a stronger European element in NATO” and warned Europe had been “behind the curve for too long” on defence and security, citing “over dependencies, over reliance, and assumptions about the world that we live in”.
Starmer also said the response from European leaders “will likely define what goes on for many years, arguably for a generation”.
The summit focused on European security, economic resilience, energy, migration, and geopolitical stability amid the ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. Starmer described Europe as facing “a war on two fronts” and said defence, trade, and energy had increasingly become “weaponized”, calling for a more coordinated European response to long-term strategic challenges.
ℹ️ EC AV Portal
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