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Europe can “no longer be a custodian for the old-world order” and needs “a more realistic and interest-driven foreign policy”, the head of the European Commission has said.
Speaking to an audience of EU ambassadors on Monday, Ursula von der Leyen said the union “will always defend and uphold the rules-based system” but could no longer rely on it to defend European interests and shelter the continent from threats.
She added: “We urgently need to reflect on whether our doctrine, our institutions and our decision making – all designed in a postwar world of stability and multilateralism – have kept pace with the speed of change around us. Whether the system that we built – with all of its well-intentioned attempts at consensus and compromise – is more a help or a hindrance to our credibility as a geopolitical actor.”
Von der Leyen, a former German defence minister who pledged to lead a “geopolitical” commission when she took office in 2019, has faced criticism in recent days for her handling of the Iran war.
A prominent MEP and former French minister, Nathalie Loiseau, last week chided von der Leyen for her telephone diplomacy to Gulf leaders after the US and Israeli strikes on Iran, accusing the commission president of usurping the role of the EU foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas.
Notably in the early days of the war, von der Leyen said “a credible transition in Iran” was urgently needed, going further than Kallas.
On Monday von der Leyen avoided criticism of the US and Israel for starting the war, saying the debate about whether the conflict was “a war of choice or a war of necessity” was a debate that “partly misses the point”. She said no one would shed tears for a regime that had “slaughtered 17,000 young people”, a reference to the most recent crackdown that some independent experts believe killed many more. She also said Iran had wreaked devastation and destabilisation across the region.
She also noted that a regional conflict with “unintended consequences” was unfolding, with spillovers affecting energy, finance, trade, transport and causing the mass displacement of people.
In a separate announcement von der Leyen promised EU humanitarian aid for 130,000 people in Lebanon and expressed concern about the impact of the conflict on Israel’s northern neighbour, where half a million people have been made homeless in recent days following Israeli bombing and evacuation orders.
Von der Leyen and the European Council president, António Costa, held talks on Monday via video link with leaders and senior ministers from Armenia, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates in what Brussels billed as a manifestation of solidarity.
In an EU statement after those talks von der Leyen and Costa “expressed openness” to enhance the maritime defensive operations Aspides and Atalanta, which are aimed at protecting waterways and preventing disruption to supply chains in and around the Red Sea.
Aspides was set up in 2024 after attacks by Houthi rebels on international shipping. Atalanta was established in 2008 to counter Somali pirates in the Horn of Africa, but its remit has been extended.
