Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer, right, attends a trilateral meeting with German Chancellor Freidrich Merz, not pictured, and French President Emmanuel Macron, second right, at the Munich Security Conference in Munich, Germany, Feb. 13. AP-Yonhap
MUNICH, Germany — British leader Keir Starmer will tell the Munich Security Conference that Europe is "a sleeping giant" and must rely less on the United States for its defence, his office said Friday.
In a speech on Saturday at the summit, the U.K. prime minister will argue that the continent must shift from overdependence on the United States towards a more European NATO.
"I'm talking about a vision of European security and greater European autonomy that does not herald U.S. withdrawal but answers the call for more burden sharing in full and remakes the ties that have served us so well," Starmer is expected to say.
The gathering comes as European leaders remain concerned that a United States led by President Donald Trump can no longer be relied upon to be the guarantor of their security.
Since returning to the White House last year, Trump has frequently criticised European countries for not sharing enough of the burden on common defence, and raised questions about the future of NATO.
European members of the transatlantic military alliance are rushing to build up their defences in the face of an increasingly belligerent Moscow, whose war in Ukraine is set to enter its fifth year this month.
"As I see it — Europe is a sleeping giant. Our economies dwarf Russia's, 10 times over," Starmer will tell allies, according to excerpts released ahead of his address.
"We have huge defence capabilities. Yet, too often, all of this has added up to less than the sum of its parts," he was to say, citing fragmented planning and procurement problems.
Late last year, talks on Britain joining the bloc's new 150-billion-euro (£130 billion) rearmament fund broke down, reportedly because London baulked at the price for entry.
Source: Korea Times News
