EU leaders will continue on Monday negotiating a massive coronavirus recovery package and the next long-term budget as three days of intense meetings in Brussels yielded no agreement.
AUSTRIAN PM DEMANDED TO LIMIT THE AMOUNT OF NON-REFUNDABLE GRANTS
EU leaders held talks in different formats yesterday and overnight, but they couldn’t agree on the next seven year’s financial framework and the recovery package.
The proposal originally included a €750 billion ($825 billion) new recovery instrument to help relaunch the European economy after the coronavirus crisis.
Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, decided to suspend talks at 6:00 a.m. local time (0400GMT), and to reconvene the meeting at 04:00 p.m. local time (1400GMT).
During the negotiations, Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte were adamant on limiting the amount of non-refundable grants from the recovery fund, as well as they have insisted on imposing strict conditionality for the financial support.
After three days of negotiations, Sunday night was reported to be particularly heated.