Kristian Vigenin: It is time for realism in European policy towards Ukraine

„We, the Socialists in Bulgaria and the Socialists here in the European Parliament, support the idea of more serious investment in defence, of building a more stable perspective for European defence and security.“ This was stated by the head of the Delegation of the Bulgarian Socialists in the EP Kristian Vigenin on BG On Air. He expressed his concern that there is talk of hundreds of billions for defence without any analysis having been made of the capacity of European industry. „Can it really take advantage of these billions in the next year or two, does it have the capacity to do that? Investment in development work is needed so that it can build capacity to produce what is required and so that this money does not go once again to foreign industries, above all the American one. It must be clarified very quickly what we want to achieve and how to achieve it“, Vigenin commented.

„The security of the European continent is not built with armament and weapons alone. It is also a matter of social security, of investment in infrastructure and everything connected with the wellbeing of citizens. Our concern as Socialists is that the cart is being put before the horse, before the threats and the means to overcome them have been clearly defined. For more than a week there has been talk of billions that have to come from somewhere, that we will take out loans“, Kristian Vigenin pointed out. He expressed disagreement that the budget deficit limits stand when it comes to loans for investment in infrastructure or social policies, while now it is proposed that weapons should also be bought with loans without this being counted as an excessive deficit.

Cohesion funds and the peace negotiations

Kristian Vigenin called the idea of using money from the cohesion funds for armament absolutely unacceptable: „In my view, what we can do with these funds is to invest as a priority in infrastructure that is important from the point of view of European defence as well, road, rail and digital. For example the Burgas to Varna motorway, the Black Sea motorway, is one such project that is for civilian use but could potentially be an important logistics corridor for defence.“

The head of the Delegation of the Bulgarian Socialists in the EP noted that the European Union is still not at the table of the negotiations on peace in Ukraine, because the situation is different, while the EU continues to talk about how it will provide still more funding and still more weapons for as long as it takes for Ukraine to win the war. „Against this background, the USA, Ukraine and Russia are talking about a ceasefire. They are talking about a plan leading to lasting peace. And while the world moves forward and the conflict develops in a completely different direction, the EU is frozen at the stage of three years ago, urging Ukraine to continue the war and literally deceiving it that it is able to replace American aid“, the MEP emphasised.

„I think it is time for realism in European policy. If that happens, the prospects are different. But if we continue with this ideologised approach, we will get nowhere“, Kristian Vigenin concluded.