EU must move on to economic and geopolitical counter-offensive, PM says
Mateusz Morawiecki, the Polish prime minister, has argued that following years of crises the European Union must follow the Polish example and embark on an economic and geopolitical counter-offensive.
"Reconstruction is a key word in the European dictionary today. The years that passed under the sign of a state of emergency are behind us," he wrote in an opinion column for the Euractiv new website published on Friday.
According to Morawiecki, the crises of recent years, the pandemic, the Russian aggression against Ukraine, and rising inflation, have exposed the weaknesses of the European economy but "they also showed that the Old Continent still has gigantic potential."
Therefore, he argued, "now, instead of focusing on ideological disputes, the European Union must move on to an economic and geopolitical counter-offensive."
He gave the example of Poland as a country with "ambitious plans for development," in the nuclear power area as a "strong and unequivocal" response to the energy crisis caused by the Russian aggression against Ukraine.
"We have started work aiming to build nuclear power plants in our country... and are one of the most interested countries in implementing small modular reactor (SMR) technology," Morawiecki said.
"Just like Poland, Europe as a whole must answer the question: What path should we take today, when abandoning Russian energy sources has become a moral and geopolitical necessity?" he argued.
In his opinion, for the EU economy to remain competitive, Europe needs access to cheap and clean energy as the import of traditional energy commodities is becoming increasingly expensive.
"Therefore, in order for Europe to maintain stable development and energy sovereignty, we must reduce imports of minerals and develop alternative energy sources – not only renewable energy sources, which are unstable and dependent on changing weather conditions, but above all stable and low-emission nuclear reactors," Morawiecki concluded.
