EU diplomats ordered to slash spending – FT

“Severe austerity measures” have reportedly been slapped on the bloc’s External Action Service after it breached spending limits

EU diplomats have been ordered to shelve planned travel and cancel functions after “significantly” exceeding their budget this year, the Financial Times has reported, citing unnamed officials.

The bloc’s External Action Service (EEAS), which acts as the EU foreign ministry, has been told to cut €43 million ($46.5 million), or almost 5% of its planned budget, after breaching agreed spending limits, the newspaper wrote, citing sources briefed on the issue.

The diplomatic service must adjust to “severe austerity measures” and will have to sell property to balance the books, the sources said. The financial squeeze will worsen next year and will make it “impossible” for the EU to maintain its existing diplomatic footprint in areas such as Africa and Latin America, they added.

The EEAS has a network of more than 140 overseas delegations and offices promoting EU interests around the world. 

Running repairs and maintenance in dozens of the bloc’s delegations is impossible, which raises serious security concerns, the report claimed.

The EEAS is mainly funded from the EU budget, which in turn is financed by individual EU countries, in proportion to their gross national income. Customs duties on imports from outside the bloc also contribute to its financing. 

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An EEAS spokesperson told the FT it had cut “all the expenditure we possibly could” and had halved the budgets of overseas offices “despite the crippling effects on our global outreach.”

Another official said the bloc’s diplomatic service is in “dire straits” financially, adding that “the world needs more diplomacy, not less.”

Meanwhile, the EU and its member states provided or committed over €143 billion ($154.6 billion) to Ukraine between February 2022 and March 2024, according to the European Council data.

The bloc also banned imports of a wide range of goods from Russia, including oil and gas, as part of an unprecedented sanctions campaign over Moscow’s military operation against Ukraine.

READ MORE: EU sends first $1.6 billion from seized Russian money to Kiev

“The war in Europe [and] increasing instability in our neighborhood and globally” are the main challenges for European foreign policy, the bloc’s next foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said last month. 

The former Estonian prime minister, known for her hardline anti-Russian stance, is set to succeed Josep Borrell as the head of the EEAS in the autumn.