EU must step up arms production, play stronger role in defence, Commission chief says

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PRAGUE (Reuters) – The European Union has not yet done enough to boost its own arms production capacities in light of geopolitical threats, in particular Russia’s war on Ukraine, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Friday.

“Protecting Europe is first and foremost Europe’s duty. And while NATO must remain the centre of our collective defence, we need a much stronger European pillar,” von der Leyen told the GLOBESEC forum, a security conference in Prague.

She also said it was an illusion that Europe had been doing enough on security at the beginning of this decade, adding that the second half of the decade will be high-risk.

“We Europeans must be on guard. We must refocus our attention on the security dimension of everything we do. We must think about our Union as intrinsically a security project.”