The strategic turn that is brewing in the European Union on Defense continues to permeate national policy and will probably continue to do so in the coming weeks. The European Rearme Plans after the United States threats to disconnect from their traditional ally have landed this Tuesday in Congress with two initiatives that have rummage into the differences that separate the two parts of the government around military spending. Some cracks that, once again, have tried to exploit the Popular Party.
The party of Alberto Núñez Feijóo has presented this afternoon a non -law proposition to “reaffirm the support of Ukraine and strengthen the transatlantic relationship”, with a writing that left few excuses to the Socialist Party to support it and that adds has rejected although without entering the bottom of the matter, as a political position that they have tried to drag their partner without success. Then, the plenary has discussed a motion of the BNG that among other things asked to reject the increase in military spending and the departure of NATO Spain and that has once again taught the differences between the two souls of the government.
Add, and especially the part of the coalition that integrates the government, has made efforts from the first moment to avoid public clash with the Socialists for this matter, as evidenced by the statement that the coalition sent after the meeting between Pedro Sánchez and Yolanda Díaz. But these discrepancies are difficult to hide in specific parliamentary debates such as this afternoon, which will be specified with votes on Thursday.
“Ladies, we will not let ourselves be dragged into a war economy that would place military spending at the high levels of the cold war of the 1970s,” the spokesman to add in foreign matters, Agustín Santos Maraver, who has questioned the PSOE to prevent them to vote in favor of the proposition of the PP has claimed from the tribune. “What Mr. Sémper has done today is trying to wash the face of the Valencia agreement with Vox and propose to the PSOE a pact in security and defense issues that what he would imply would be to deliver the head of the government president in the silver tray to the Popular Party […]. They will not count on us and we call them to act together with the entire progressive left of this country.
Minutes later, the socialist deputy Obdulia Taboadela remembered the government president’s commitment to carry up to 2% the percentage of defense expenditure on the gross domestic product (GDP). And in the second point, the one who debated the motion of the BNG, his party partner Esther Peña has opted to increase the expenditure so that the European Union has its own capacity to “deter”, financing capacities of “intelligence and cybersecurity.” “The debate is not NATO yes or NATO not as long as Donald Trump leads us to defend ourselves on our own,” he said.
Faced with the strategy of boycotting the PP initiative, the Socialists have moved during the day they will vote in favor of four of the five points of that text, written sufficiently wide to concite their vote and exhibit the government divisions. These first points speak of reaffirming Spain’s commitment to Ukraine, defending the involvement of the EU and Ukraine in the peace negotiations about the conflict or fulfilling the “commitments” acquired by Spain with NATO on investment in defense, that is, the goal of reaching that 2% spending.
Precisely the only point that could grant the support of adding will receive the rejection of the PSOE. The last: “To guarantee that any decision that affects the position of Spain in relation to the war in Ukraine, the transatlantic link or the commitments with the Atlantic is debated and approved by a majority in the Congress of Deputies.”
“Of course, all this must be discussed and approved in Congress, headquarters of popular sovereignty or we have already given that sovereignty in security and defense issues,” said Santos Maraver. “What is to come to Congress will come to Congress,” said Taboadela, in reference to an eventual sending of troops to conflict zones that the Government at the moment does not contemplate.
The division between the executive partners can be deepened on Thursday if both vote separately the motion of the BNG, which calls for example to reject the expense and that Spain leaves NATO, also that it promotes its dissolution. Although the plurinational group will vote in favor of the text if it remains as it is, it has registered three technical amendments to adapt them more to the positions they have defended these days. Amends that, if approved they could bring the PSOE to support it although the point on the Atlantic Alliance complicates everything.
The plurinational group has proposed an alternative writing to the point that requests the output of NATO. “Promoting a model of autonomous and shared European defense and security, disconnected from NATO, committed to the defense of peace, cooperation and peaceful resolution of conflicts as established by the United Nations Charter”, exposes the proposal to add, which also amends the point on the increase in military spending to also explain its rejection of the reduction for these purposes “of the available resources that must be destined for social policies or public investments necessary ”.
The BNG has not advanced whether or not to accept the amendments to add, although its initial intention was that the motion will vote for points. It is a way that groups have small parliamentary victories. The problem is that if the nationalists accept the amendments of the plurinational group, the motion can no longer be voted on points, a paradox of the parliamentary technique that adds uncertainty to the vote on Thursday, but that in any case does not hide the difficulties that the Government has to agree on an issue like this.
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