The Government Will Today Approve Extraordinary Spending Of 1 Billion Euros On Defence. His Podemos Partners Say Sánchez Has Lost His Way

Forty years of Spanish constitution: What's next?

The government will today approve a loan of up to 1 billion euros for the Ministry of Defence, according to El País. A decision that does not have the approval of Unidas Podemos and was not even consulted over with them, according to purple sources. However, government sources specify that “all ministerial departments were informed” in the General Commission of Secretaries of State and Undersecretaries held the previous week. They also stress that ‘the Prime Minister has been clear and clear about the European commitment to reach the military spending target of 2% of GDP by 2029’.

But it is this commitment made by the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, to NATO allies to increase the amount allocated to Defence, which complicates the negotiations for new Budgets with his main allies. Both in the Government with Unidas Podemos, and in the Congress of Deputies, with ERC and Bildu.

Podemos believes that the increase in military spending is detrimental to the needs demanded by the public, and for this reason has once again made public its criticism in this regard. Yesterday, the Minister for Social Rights and leader of Podemos, Ione Belarra, accused Sánchez of losing his “direction” and demanded that he “recover it” with a clear objective: to abandon the pretensions of increasing the Defence budget and to focus on increasing public services. In the minister’s opinion, society is not perceiving “clear political objectives in the actions of the coalition government” because of “recent events”, in reference to the commitments arising from the NATO summit.

Yesterday, the parliamentary group of Unidas Podemos decided jointly to vote against extending the number of US destroyers in Rota when the vote comes to the Congress of Deputies to modify the cooperation agreement with the United States. Previously, it will be debated within the government and the purple party will show its rejection. Another “no” on defence matters that heightens tensions in Moncloa.

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