News - Peskov: The idea of turning EU into a defense union shows a mood for confrontation

The plans of European Commission head Ursula von der Leyen to turn the EU into a defense union indicate Europe's mood for militarization and confrontation. This was stated to journalists by the press secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov, TASS reports.Commenting on the initiative of the head of the European Commission, the Kremlin spokesman said: “This once again confirms the attitude of European states to militarization, to escalation of tension, to confrontation and to reliance on confrontational methods in their foreign policy.”Peskov drew attention to the fact that the joint defense and security policy is one of the areas of common work within the European Union. “This has always been the case within the framework of European integration,” he pointed out. At the same time, the Kremlin spokesman emphasized that “this has never been the main direction of the European Union's development.” “In all likelihood, Ms. von der Leyen was talking about changing priorities and giving military coloring to this union,” he concluded.“It is difficult to give any exhaustive interpretations here, but clearly, this work will overlap with the interaction that the EU countries have within the North Atlantic Alliance,” the Russian presidential spokesman added.