Off the wire
• French centrist Bayrou says to back Macron in presidential race  • Macedonia launches awareness campaign against discrimination  • Norway's taxi licence rules breach EEA rules: monitoring authority  • 1st LD: Scientists discover 7 Earth-sized exoplanets around nearby star  • UN envoy hopes to keep up momentum to solve Syria crisis  • Roundup: Tehran conference on Palestine urges unity against Israel  • Israel upgrades its Iron Dome missile defense system  • Feature: Greece struggling to improve conditions for refugees year after border closures  • Majority of Americans fear U.S. will become engaged in another war: poll  • Nigerian police confirm kidnapping of German scholars  
You are here: 　 Home

Defending national interests may become more difficult for Latvia after Brexit: PM

Xinhua, February 23, 2017 Adjust font size:

Defending national interests might become more difficult for Latvia after Brexit, given the external issues the European Union (EU) currently facing, Latvian Prime Minister Maris Kucinskis told members of the parliament's public expenditure and audit committee on Wednesday.

But Kucinskis assured the committee that the EU had no plans to end its payments to member states.

Although Britain's departure from the bloc is expected to reduce the EU budget by approximately 7 percent, funding will be provided to Latvia during the next programming period, starting after 2020. This, however, will require more targeted investing.

Representatives of the finance ministry, meanwhile, indicated in their presentation to lawmakers that the Brexit-related net reduction of the EU budget was estimated at around 6 percent. Talks on the EU's multiannual budget period after 2020 have only just begun, the ministry's representatives said.

On Tuesday, Kucinskis met with the British Secretary of State for Exiting the EU David Davis, who visited the three Baltic states this week in preparation for the upcoming Brexit talks. Endit