Germany’s Merz: EU must fold Ukraine support into bloc budget

Folding Ukraine support into the EU's multi-year budget would shift it from ad hoc pledges to a structural, recurring commitment — a materially different proposition for a bloc whose financing decisions require broad consensus. Merz's public acknowledgment of at least four dissenting member states, made alongside Orbán, signals that the political constraint is not merely fiscal but foundational to how the EU allocates shared resources. The linkage to collective security reframes the debate away from aid accounting and toward budget architecture. Whether that framing can convert holdouts before the budget talks conclude is the open question.