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Twenty member states have flagged their interest in using loans issued by the European Commission to fund defence projects for an estimated total of over €100 billion, Andrius Kubilius revealed on Thursday.
The Commissioner for Defence and Space said on X that he is “impressed to hear that already 20 member states will request the loans”.
“More than €100 billion will be requested to ramp up European defence,” he added.
The Commission’s loan programme, dubbed SAFE, is a key plank of the ‘Readiness 2030’ proposal that aims to see hundreds of billions of euros invested into defence across the EU before the end of the decade.
The EU’s executive, which has a better credit rating than many member states, had planned to raise up to €150 billion on the markets through the scheme for member states to finance defence acquisitions together.
Member states have until 29 July to officially put in a request for financing. The first disbursements are expected early next year.
Kubilius did not mention which member states have already notified the Commission of their intention to make use of the scheme, but several had already publicly made their interest known, like Latvia.
An additional advantage of using SAFE is that member states will not have to pay Value Added Tax (VAT) on the purchases.
This is a developing story. Check back later for updates.
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