Schallenberg: China the "Laughing Third Party" in Trade War

In a "trade war (with the US, note) everyone would pay and there would be a laughing third party, which would be China," said Interim Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg (ÖVP) before the start of the informal EU summit on Monday in Brussels to journalists. Schallenberg emphasized that it makes "sense to come together without an overflowing agenda" and to deal with two topics, security "and the relationship with our most important partner USA".

Schallenberg: Ring of Fire around Europe

"We have a ring of fire around Europe, we do not know our future," said the Chancellor. It is "sensible to consider what we need for the future," and "not to take out fire insurance when the house is already on fire." "The USA is our most important trading partner, but also vice versa, we would mutually harm each other," said Schallenberg on the occasion of the tariffs against EU goods announced again by US President Donald Trump and possible reactions of the EU. But: "We are prepared for this, it is not as if all this comes as a surprise. We are ready to stand up for our interests as the European Union." It is particularly important "that we remain united and do not let ourselves be divided, because only then are we strong". Schallenberg warned against "threatening gestures in advance" and was confident that an agreement with the USA could be reached.

More Money for Defence

The second major topic of the summit is also to make Europe "more resilient, efficient, autonomous in the field of security and defence". The defence budgets are to increase. As a neutral country, Austria plays a special role here. Schallenberg emphasized that there is "no standard size for defence policy in the EU", each state has its own policy and there are states like Austria that are neutral. Even within the framework of neutrality, however, "pooling and sharing", joint research and procurement, "would also be advantageous for us and would make sense".

He is very much in favour of applying the rules of the internal market also to defence. "Everyone is currently buying from their own defence industries and there are no Europe-wide purchases," said Schallenberg. He emphasized that he is not part of the government negotiations and does not want to anticipate, but also in the case of airspace surveillance, Austria's basic line has been unchanged for years and pooling makes sense. The background is the discussions about a possible exit from the "Sky Shield" system.

Schallenberg welcomed that with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, a Briton is sitting at the dinner table for the first time since Brexit. He appealed for a "much closer cooperation also with Great Britain in the security sector." Both sides have weakened themselves here with Brexit, "we should jump over our own shadow," and "look for opportunities for a new, innovative cooperation".

(APA/red)

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