(13 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Pruszkow, Poland – 13 January 2025
1. Wide of Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu, British Defense Minister Luke Polland and Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto walking to lecterns
2. SOUNDBITE (German) Boris Pistorius, German Defense Minister:
“I just believe that a static debate about percentages doesn’t really help us if, in the end, it doesn’t realize what NATO has decided together, what the goals must be. That’s what matters in my opinion.”
++WHITE FLASH++
3. SOUNDBITE (German) Boris Pistorius, German Defense Minister:
"And yes, you can’t put an upper limit on the amount, and at the same time you have to briefly note: 5%, as Donald Trump recently put it, would mean for Germany that we would have to spend slightly more than 40% of our entire budget on defense. I think that ends the debate very quickly."
4. SOUNDBITE (Italian) Guido Crosetto, Italian Defense Minister:
“Our action travels this difficult ridge, where on the one hand we know that we have to spend more on our security, on the other hand we know that we have to revive the economy. If we combine the two, i.e. if we make the European defense industry one of the ways to revive the economy, we can combine the two.”
5. SOUNDBITE (French) Sebastien Lecornu, French Defense Minister:
"You can see that we are in a world in which we can be defeated without having been invaded. And that means that the responsibility for the defense of our countries will go well beyond military issues alone."
6. Wide of press conference
STORYLINE:
The defense ministers of Europe’s five top military spenders said Monday that they want to continue increasing their investments in defense but said meeting US President-elect Trump’s challenge for them to raise spending to 5% of their overall economic output won’t be simple.
The defense ministers of Germany, France, Britain, Italy and Poland met near Warsaw for a meeting in a new format that they established after Donald Trump was re-elected last year.
They are seeking ways to maintain their support for Ukraine as U.S. policy is expected to shift when Trump takes power.
Their first meeting in this format of five was held in Berlin in late November.
The German minister, Boris Pistorius, stressed at the start of the meeting that they all support a just peace for Ukraine, one in which Kyiv has a say over its fate.
They also addressed questions over military spending after Trump recently called for NATO allies to increase their spending to 5% of GDP, a level that no NATO member has reached — not even Poland, which is the closest, spending over 4% and expected to approach 5% this year.
Several of the ministers said that focusing on the number as a percentages isn’t enough.
“I just think that a static debate about percentages doesn’t really help us if it doesn’t ultimately lead to the implementation of what NATO has agreed upon together, what the goals must be," Pistorius said told reporters after the meeting, when asked about the matter by a reporter.
"In my opinion, that’s what matters."
He also said that for Germany to invest 5% in defense would mean spending a little more than 40% of the entire national budget on defense.
“I think that would put an end to the debate very quickly."
His Italian counterpart, Guido Crosetto, said his government knows it needs to spend more on defense but also needs to weigh that against reviving the economy.
AP Video shot by Rafal Niedzielski
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