First of all, thank you to the Cypriot Council Presidency for presenting today's meeting with their policy priorities.
We welcome the important emphasis the work programme places on key issues, including competitiveness, defence and the digital euro.
I look forward to working closely with the Cyprus Presidency to achieve the milestones included in the presidency programme.
We started this morning with discussions on the EU's economic outlook in view of the latest geopolitical developments.
Our conclusion was clear: more than ever, our Union needs to show unity, decisiveness and strength.
We need to work on enhancing our competitiveness and defence capabilities.
Then, we held our regular exchange on Ukraine.
In that context, I outlined our proposal to deliver a further €90 billion in financial support for Ukraine for 2026 and 2027.
This support will help Ukraine safeguard its financial sustainability and strengthen its defence.
This is crucial to ensure a just and lasting peace, and real security for Ukraine and Europe in the long-term.
Of course, Ukraine's financing needs are both sizeable and urgent.
The Commission is committed to working with the co-legislators to ensure this proposal is adopted as quickly as possible.
We will also continue to engage closely with international partners, to ensure delivery of their financial support commitments for this year and beyond.
This includes in relation to the implementation of the G7-led Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration loans, under which €35 billion has already been disbursed to Ukraine.
Moving to the Recovery and Resilience Facility.
There, we provided the regular update.
Since our last meeting in December, the Commission has disbursed an additional €15.5 billion to four Member States.
Looking ahead, this year will be decisive for the Recovery and Resilience Facility.
We are now on the home straight.
Member States must complete all agreed milestones by the end of August.
So, once again, I strongly encouraged Member States to accelerate implementation of their plans.
And, to that end, I welcome today's endorsement of amendments to the recovery and resilience plans of six Member States: Finland, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden.
This brings the total number of Member States to have simplified or streamlined their plans to 24.
As a result, the number of milestones and targets that are left to be assessed has been cut down by 20% per plan, on average.
We also discussed the implementation of the new economic governance framework.
Today ministers adopted a decision to formally open the excessive deficit procedure for Finland.
They also adopted a recommendation for a corrective path for Finland to put an end to its excessive deficit by 2028.
The Commission will present its first assessment of effective action under this recommendation as part of the European Semester Spring Package.
Finally, I welcome the Council's approval of conclusions on the 2026 Alert Mechanism Report, which the Commission presented as part of the European Semester Autumn Package.
The report underlines the need to remain vigilant in monitoring the emergence and evolution of macroeconomic imbalances.
