00:00For our top story today we're taking you to Cyprus where EU leaders are holding an informal summit
00:05against a fraught geopolitical backdrop. Last night over dinner leaders discussed plans to
00:12revive the EU's little-known defence clause amid deepening cracks in the relationship between the
00:18US and its European allies. Today they'll tackle the EU's long-term budget and they'll also lunch
00:24with leaders from the Middle East. For more we can cross over to Cyprus now and to our correspondent
00:30Jorge Liborero who's there for us. Great to see you Jorge this morning. Listen this should have
00:36been Viktor Orbán's last summit but he's decided to skip and that really seems to be defining this
00:43gathering. Calimera Marit, indeed the longest serving member of the European Council, is not making his
00:53way to this summit. It would have been his farewell summit, so to speak, after 16 years of uninterrupted
00:59power. But as we remember Viktor Orbán was defeated in the polls earlier this month and opposition
01:05leader Peter Magyar took over with the promise of restoring ties between Budapest and Brussels.
01:12Leaders yesterday, as they made their way to the dinner, were noticeably relieved by the change
01:18in power because Viktor Orbán has been a figure of disruption and obstruction for 16 years and now
01:25everybody wants to bring back a sense of normalcy into the collective decision-making.
01:31And Jorge, the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, was also there joining the leaders over dinner
01:38yesterday. And he had some very interesting comments on Ukraine's bid to join the European Union.
01:48Yes, indeed. At first, we didn't know if Zelensky was going to make it in person to the summit here
01:54in Cyprus. But after the vetoes on the 90 billion loan and the package of sanctions against Russia were
02:00lifted earlier this week, he decided to show up in person and his message was unmistakable. He was
02:07pushing to really speed up the accession process of Ukraine, which has been blocked by Hungary for
02:13almost two years now. The frustration of Zelensky was very palpable as well. He said that he needs a
02:20clear date for accession and he wants to speed up the process as soon as possible. However, other leaders
02:27like the prime ministers of Belgium and Luxembourg were more cautious. They said that they don't want
02:32any shortcuts. They don't want any fast tracks for Ukraine's accession. So my short analysis
02:37here in Cyprus is that after the end of the urban era, EU leaders will have to finally face head
02:45on
02:45the complex issue of Ukraine's accession with no easy answers. And yesterday, I got to talk to one
02:51of these leaders, the Estonian prime minister, Kristen Michal. And we talked about accession,
02:56but also other topics that are hot on the agenda right now. Take a listen.
03:01We'll see because always there's a chance at least for a fresh start. So it will mean that
03:08you can start again. And to be honest, I cannot see any other way that Ukraine's future is in the
03:17Europe. That is definitely so. That will mean that the question is only when, not if and how.
03:26Now, I know you've been working on an initiative to introduce an European wide ban for Russian
03:32soldiers who have taken part in the full scale invasion of Ukraine. Why are you pushing for
03:37this measure now? And why is it so important to you? It's not even important to me, but it's
03:44important to everybody living in Europe because to put it very simple terms that before the war
03:52and at the start of the war, Russia had less men under the arms than right now. So we have
03:57more men
03:58under the arms right now than at the start of the war. And we would imagine for a moment that
04:04the war
04:05would stop. There will be ceasefire, peace and some, but hopefully just in lasting peace. Fine. But what
04:12will those people do? Most of them are criminals, but they have to be treated as heroes inside Russia.
04:18So once again, I would ask everybody that do you want these guys near to your home? No, you don't.
04:23So
04:23that that's why you, you have to ban them for life from Schengen. Ideally, you think it could happen
04:29this year or do you think it needs more time? Ideally, it could happen. It should happen before the summer,
04:36but this is ideally. I have this kind of feeling that we will be talking about it before the summer
04:43already, but I don't know if enough decisions will be made before the summer, but I hope so.
04:48Another issue here for this informal summit is mutual assistance. We know that the European treaties
04:54have an article of mutual assistance 42.7. It hasn't been explored until now, but we also know that many
05:01member states like yours are also part of NATO, which has an article five of collective defense.
05:05Do you see a possible contradiction between these two articles or can they coexist?
05:11They are coexisting because, for example, NATO article five has been invoked only once
05:18from the United States and European article 42.7. It has been also invoked once by France. So
05:27the question is about the need and they can exist together, I would say, because
05:34usually it's pretty much overlapping what we're doing because you need certain assistance. You need
05:39your allies to act with you. So I would say this is working well, but also we should talk about
05:46European capabilities, because as we can see, President Trump's message is also that Europe should
05:52bear more burden in its own defense. Trump has also threatened to withdraw the United States from
05:58NATO. He's been saying this several times. We don't know what's going to happen, but do you think that
06:03because of these threats that he's making so publicly, the value of article five has been decreased,
06:09that it's not so powerful anymore? I would say no to that because, for example, when we had Russian
06:19MiGs in our space a little bit before that certain Russian drones in Poland's airspace, which was shot
06:25down first time in NATO's history at that moment. At that moment, Trump's message was quite clear that
06:31America is standing to protect Baltics Poland and so on. So I would say that the messages have been quite
06:38clear that NATO is working. And also in Hague, we had NATO summit there and Trump said that if Europe
06:44is
06:45sharing the burden, he will commit to NATO. Yes, I can understand that there's a lot of political
06:52messages, but the military side is working absolutely as well.
Comments