ATHENS – Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis spoke in support of the urgent creation of a Recovery Fund in addition to the multiannual financial framework (MFF), the EU’s long-term budget, at Thursday’s EU Summit video conference.

The meeting by EU leaders reviewed the union’s response to the Covid-19 outbreak and is the fourth of its kind.

Mitsotakis added that this fund should be ‘huge’ and be financed with a common long-term debt financial instrument. It should be frontloaded and focus primarily on subsidies to member states rather than on loans. “We must not allow further increase of the debt-to-GDP ratio,” he warned.

A strategy that would not burden each country’s public debt would benefit all countries, he added, noting that Europe must not do ‘too little, too late’ again.

He also suggested that European Council President Charles Michel should request of the Commission to work out a specific proposal for the resumption of air connections as soon as possible. He pointed out that the European single-currency market does not exist only to support the free movement of goods but also facilitates the free movement of people. He placed particular emphasis on the support of tourism in southern European countries, and said the market urgently needs a positive signal.

The prime minister also reiterated his proposal for a common European approach to the patents of a potential vaccine for the coronavirus, in order to ensure equal access by member states when mass production of the vaccine becomes possible.

Finally, he stressed that a clear message should be sent to Turkey for its provocative actions both in the Aegean Sea and against Cyprus, referring to the intensity of Turkish violations through overflights and Ankara’s recent attempt to violate the Greek-Turkish borders at Evros.