French MEPs Raphaël Glucksmann (S&D), Bernard Guetta (Renew Europe) and Emmanuel Maurel (The Left) argued on Friday 1 October for the EU’s strategic autonomy, particularly in view of the latest difficulties in relations with the United States.
“We have an American partner that shows contempt towards its European partner and we have the absolute need to assert the EU’s strategic autonomy”, explained Mr Glucksmann at a press conference ahead of next week’s plenary vote on the report by Tonino Picula (S&D, Croatia) on the future of EU-US relations. He believes that if Europe wants to have weight and a voice in the world, it must “build its security and defence instruments and promote its interests, including on trade issues, in an autonomous way”.
Glucksmann and Maurel insisted on the need for trade measures, calling for the adoption of the ‘Buy European Act’. In their view, the EU must also develop autonomous trade defence tools as soon as possible. Glucksmann regretted that the European Commission’s legislative proposal on due diligence for companies is only coming at the end of the year.
Recalling that a few years ago no one was discussing strategic autonomy and that now “no one disputes the idea”, Mr Guetta warned that achieving such autonomy would not be easy. “When it comes to sovereignty, we will experience some turbulence, because it is one thing to agree on strategic autonomy and common defence, but it is another thing to define what these should be. There are inevitably differences in political views, economic interests, historical experiences”, he explained.
According to Mr Maurel, Europeans were not making progress on strategic autonomy, especially in the military sphere, adding that it would be “many years yet” before European autonomy is achieved, “assuming that it happens”. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant and Léa Marchal)