BONN: Europe needs to spend more on defence but tackling poverty and climate change also contribute to world peace, Germany’s foreign minister said on Friday, responding to US President Donald Trump’s calls for greater European military spending.
Germany has Europe’s largest economy but currently spends only about 1.2 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on defence, well below Nato’s target of two per cent.
“There is no question that Europe will have to take more responsibility for that (military spending), but we cannot reduce security and peace policies to just the extent of military spending,” German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said.
“That will not allow us to fight climate change, drought or poverty,” Gabriel told reporters at the end of a gathering of foreign ministers from the G20 largest economies attended by Trump’s new Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
“An important message from this G20 (meeting) was that peace and development prospects are two sides of the same coin,” Gabriel said.
Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen said on Friday said Germany was working to boost its defence spending, but that it would take time to reach the 2 per cent goal.
Gabriel told reporters on Thursday that Germany would have to spend about 25 billion euros more a year to meet the target, but said it had already invested 30 to 40 billion more to integrate about a million refugees, many of whom were displaced by failed military interventions.
“That shows that focusing on military interventions also taps funding that could be better spent in combatting hunger and misery,” he said.
Germany has sought to focus the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting on efforts to better utilise the potential of many African countries and halt a growing stream of economic refugees fleeing to Europe.
The European Union is also taking steps to stem immigration from Africa, which is set to rise further after 181,000 people arrived last year and an estimated 4,500 are believed to have died while crossing the Mediterranean, often in flimsy boats.
Anthony Mothae Maruping, economics commissioner for the African Union, participated in the G20 meeting, which also focused on implementing the UN Agenda 2030 for sustainable development agreed by all members of the United Nations.
Gabriel, who took over as German foreign minister last month, said the G20 countries, which account for about four-fifths of the world’s gross domestic product, agreed they had a responsibility to prevent crises before they gathered steam. — Reuters
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