The European Parliament on Tuesday (May 9) will vote on a Commission proposal to increase ammunition production to help Ukraine and replenish the stocks of EU member countries.
Under the plan, the EU would give subsidies to European arms firms for investments that increase production of ammunition and missiles.
“The war is also a war of industrial base and production capacity. The more we increase it, the more credible we will be. For the weeks, for the months to come, it is credibility – our credibility – which will also be the ingredients for peace,” Thierry Breton, the commissioner for the EU’s internal market, told the European Parliament after a debate on the proposal.
The EU executive’s scheme is the third part of a broader EU effort to get more ammunition and arms to Ukraine, particularly 155 millimetre artillery shells, which Kyiv is pleading for as the fight against Russia’s invasion has become a war of attrition.
As part of the push to supply 1 million shells to Ukraine within 12 months, the EU has already agreed to set aside 1 billion euros for ammunition and missiles that its members send to Ukraine from stockpiles.
The latest element of the ammunition drive aims to give arms firms incentives to increase their production.
It would set aside 500 million euros from the EU budget to part-finance projects that increase capacity. It would also allow EU regional development cash, known as cohesion funds, and coronavirus pandemic recovery funds to be used for such projects.
Greens MEP Hannah Neumann warned the money “should not be misused as a money making machine for an already highly profitable arms industry at the expense of EU taxpayers”.
Reuters
