On Wednesday 11 March, Member States’ ambassadors to the European Union (Coreper) will begin preparations for the Spring European Council on the basis of initial draft conclusions.
Based on an annotated agenda (see EUROPE 13820/13), this initial draft includes a few lines on the “catastrophic” humanitarian situation in Gaza. The EU27 will demand compliance with all the provisions of UN Resolution 2803: disarmament of Hamas and other armed groups, full withdrawal of Israeli forces and deployment of the temporary ‘International Stabilisation Force’.
Israel will be urged to allow “immediate, unimpeded” access for humanitarian aid and to reverse its decision regarding its NGO registration law. The EU27 will condemn Israel’s unilateral actions to expand its illegal presence in the West Bank, condemning the “growing” violence.
With regard to Ukraine, the authors of the draft conclusions hope that Hungary will have lifted its veto on the EU loan for 2026 and 2027 (see other news).
On the internal market, European leaders will be putting pressure on the European legislator to achieve concrete results from 2026 in a number of areas, including: the Industrial Accelerator Act (see EUROPE 13821/1), the 28th regime for European companies, expected on 18 March, all the ‘omnibus’ regulatory simplification packages, the integration of electricity grids (see EUROPE 13824/12) as well as several proposals in the financial sphere (securitisation, supplementary pensions, supervision of financial infrastructures).
A review of banking prudential rules is also expected in 2026 to increase banks’ ability to finance the economy.
See the draft European Council conclusions: https://aeur.eu/f/l3j (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion, Camille-Cerise Gessant, Solenn Paulic)