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The Party of European Socialists has gathered in Amsterdam on Thursday for a two-day congress to elect its top positions and discuss its European-level strategy.<\/p>\n
Europe\u2019s leading Socialists, such as Spain\u2019s Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez, European Council\u2019s President Ant\u00f3nio Costa and Dutch Socialist leader Frans Timmermans, will discuss options for Europe\u2019s autonomy from the US in the fields of defence, security, and trade, internal sources told Euronews. <\/p>\n
The PES congress convenes just after the European Commission presented<\/a> a European defence roadmap aimed at achieving the continent’s \u201cself-sufficiency\u201d in defence. At the same time, nearly 80% of the military equipment EU member states procure comes from outside the bloc, mainly from the US.<\/p>\n The congress also follows a reprimand by US President Donald Trump to the Spanish head of government S\u00e1nchez, currently the most prominent figure in the socialist camp.<\/p>\n The friction between the US and Spain dates back to the NATO summit in June, when allies met in The Hague to agree on a new commitment to spend 5% of their GDP on defence.<\/p>\n But the Spanish prime minister called<\/a> the 5% figure “unreasonable” and “counterproductive”, and asked for \u2014 and obtained \u2014 a tailor-made exemption for his country.<\/p>\n The language of the final NATO declaration was then adjusted to allow greater flexibility in reaching the 5% target, effectively sparing Spain from the pledge.<\/p>\n This disagreement led Trump to criticise Spain\u2019s attitude, even to the point of suggesting<\/a> that the country should be \u201cthrown out\u201d of NATO.<\/p>\n Another contentious issue in this framework is the Socialist approach to the ceasefire in Gaza.<\/p>\n During the Israel-Hamas war, Socialist MEPs and leaders were at the forefront of European criticism of Israel for its actions in Gaza, pushing for EU sanctions and invoking the suspension of the EU-Israel association agreement. Most of them have defined Israel\u2019s action as \u201ca genocide\u201d.<\/p>\n Now that the war has ended, the left-leaning political party must redefine its strategy on the issue, which could also become a political battle for the future. <\/p>\n