“Croatia can meet NATO’s defence spending targets without it coming at the expense of social or other benefits,” Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Thursday.

“Given our economic growth, which is among the highest in the EU, I believe these ambitions are certainly attainable and not at the expense of social or other benefits,” he said upon arriving in Brussels for an EU leaders’ summit.

NATO leaders agreed yesterday on significantly higher defence spending targets. By 2035, member states are expected to allocate 5% of their GDP to defence – 3.5% for military expenditure and 1.5% for infrastructure serving the common good.

Plenković said Croatia, regardless of NATO’s targets, had already planned to raise its defence budget to 3% of GDP by 2030.

He said economic growth allowed for increased investment in defence, with a focus on strengthening the industrial and technological base. For equipment Croatia cannot produce domestically and must procure from abroad, he stressed the need to ensure purchases are made at reasonable, not inflated, prices.

EU leaders gathered today for their regular summit, with a wide range of topics on the agenda, from geoeconomic challenges and economic competitiveness to defence, security, Ukraine, sanctions against Russia, trade, migration, and the Western Balkans.

Plenković said he initiated at the previous summit in March for a discussion on the Western Balkans to be held at this summit.

There is willingness from 26 EU member states to open negotiations with Ukraine in the first cluster, but Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban remains opposed. Such a decision requires consensus among all member states. Given Orban’s intransigence, the idea has emerged in Brussels “to conduct” informal negotiations with Kyiv and “formalise them” once the dispute with Hungary is resolved.

Another divisive issue is the agreement on EU-Israel relations. About half the member states support a revision due to violations of humanitarian law in Gaza, but consensus on this is unlikely.