President Pedro Sánchez’s trip to Berlin with the Chancellor of the Federal Republic of A…Pool Moncloa/Borja Puig de la Bellacasa
The President of the Government has stressed the need for the EU to assume with unity “the mandate and responsibility” arising from the informal meeting in Versailles, and for the European Council next week to approve “concrete, immediate and effective” measures to protect European citizens from the escalation in electricity prices exacerbated by Putin’s war.

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The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, met today with the Chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, as part of the Spanish President’s European tour with the aim of bringing together positions and finding solutions that will immediately address, after the next European Council on 24 and 25 March, the modification of the electricity market pricing model in the EU.

For Sánchez, following the informal meeting of heads of state and government last week in Versailles, the EU leaders have “a mandate and a responsibility” to European citizens, companies and industry to take “key” urgent steps at the Council, with “concrete and immediate” measures to deal with the aggression of Vladimir Putin’s regime against Ukraine and the impact on the EU’s economies.

“In Versailles we all agreed on the need for an effective and urgent response to the price escalation. We want a strong and determined message of joint EU action to come out of next week’s leaders’ meeting in Brussels. To deal with Putin’s aggression, of course, but also with challenges that have been aggravated by the invasion, in particular, the problems arising from rising energy prices”.

Spain has been proposing ways to address this challenge since last September. During today’s meeting, President Sánchez presented Chancellor Scholz with proposals drawn up by the Spanish government, and both leaders agreed on the need to diversify Europe’s energy supply as soon as possible in order to move away from Russian dependence.

Likewise, Pedro Sánchez and Olaf Scholz have shown their agreement on finding solutions that guarantee supply and have agreed to continue working intensively in the coming days to fulfil the Versailles mandate and find solutions that can be approved at next week’s European Council in Brussels. In this regard, Sánchez encouraged the EU to continue to act in the same direction as it has shown both during the COVID-19 pandemic and in the response to Putin, with unity, which is the basis of Europe’s strength.

“Today Europe is united in the response to Putin. United in support for the government and people of Ukraine. And united in responding to the economic and social consequences of the war on EU territory. We were together to respond to the pandemic and we will be together to protect our citizens and our businesses. That is why it is essential that we give a joint response to energy prices, to protect the recovery in which we are immersed, now that we are leaving the pandemic behind us”.

For the President of the Government, European citizens cannot wait any longer, the time to act and take decisions is now. “Our families, our businesses and our industry are waiting for answers that Europe must give them. We cannot let them down.