{"id":467425,"date":"2026-10-08T19:23:00","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T17:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/10\/08\/costa-con-il-consiglio-europeo-di-ottobre-i-negoziati-sul-qfp-entrano-in-una-fase-decisiva\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T20:00:22","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T18:00:22","slug":"costa-with-the-october-european-council-negotiations-on-the-mff-are-entering-a-decisive-phase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/10\/08\/costa-with-the-october-european-council-negotiations-on-the-mff-are-entering-a-decisive-phase\/","title":{"rendered":"Costa: with the October European Council, \u201cnegotiations on the MFF are entering a decisive phase\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels \u2013 The Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), the single market, support for Ukraine, enlargement and the situation in the Middle East: these are some of the issues on the agenda for the imminent European Summit in October. The President of the European Council, Ant\u00f3nio Costa<\/strong>, sent today (8 October) the official invitation letter<\/a> to the 27 leaders, outlining the issues awaiting them. The heads of state will meet in Brussels on Thursday 15 October; proceedings will begin at 10.00, and Costa hopes to \u201cconclude the proceedings with lunch on Friday 16 October.\u201d <\/p>\n

“Against a backdrop of growing geopolitical uncertainty, our next meeting will focus heavily on the economy<\/strong> and on finding answers to the challenges affecting European competitiveness and affordability,” announced Costa, suggesting that economic issues will be the main focus of the meeting. Very specific pressing concerns drive this need: \u201cWe must provide guidance to the Commission on targeted and temporary measures to alleviate the impact of high energy prices on citizens and businesses, while continuing to pursue our strategy of reducing Europe\u2019s dependence on fossil fuels,\u201d explained the President. <\/p>\n

At the same time, it will be important to \u201creview, together with the President of the European Parliament, the implementation of our 2026\u20132027overarching competitiveness strategy: the \u2018One Europe, One Market\u2019 agenda.\u201d This is the roadmap in which the European Council had adopted a programme of concrete measures with ambitious deadlines to strengthen the EU\u2019s competitiveness, resilience and strategic autonomy \u201cin 2026, where possible, and by the end of 2027 at the latest<\/a>\u201d. Costa warned: \u201cWe need to ensure that additional progress is made, so that the ambition at Leaders’ level \u2013 and the expectations that have been raised \u2013 are matched by concrete outcomes.\u201d <\/p>\n

With regard to the MFF \u2013 the EU\u2019s long-term spending programme \u2013 for the period 2028\u20132034, the President stated that the negotiations \u201cwill enter a decisive phase\u201d and that \u201cour next meeting must therefore bring us closer to consolidating the key elements needed to reach a final agreement by the end of the year<\/strong>\u201d. For this reason, the Portuguese President is counting on both the leadership of his colleagues and their spirit of cooperation. \u201cAchieving a timely agreement,\u201d he noted, \u201cwill be crucial to ensuring that our economies have the predictability and stability they need in an unstable and unpredictable world.\u201d <\/p>\n

Turning to foreign policy, Ukraine remains \u201ca key priority\u201d, but above all the Union\u2019s support in the face of Russia\u2019s war of aggression. As winter approaches, \u201cit will therefore be important to hear from President Zelenskyy regarding operational needs,\u201d Costa emphasised. For this reason, it is advisable for the leaders to \u201ctake stock of Ukraine\u2019s progress on the path to EU accession<\/strong>, by then hopefully having opened further clusters.\u201d The meeting \u201cwill also address Russia\u2019s increasingly reckless behaviour, including its campaign of hybrid attacks<\/a> across Europe,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

In addition to the economy and Ukraine, leaders must tackle what Costa has described as \u201ctwo important strategic discussions\u201d. The first is migration<\/strong>. Although there has been a \u201csignificant and steady decrease in arrivals of irregular migrants,\u201d demonstrating that \u201cthe EU legislation adopted is producing results,\u201d it is necessary to \u201cremain vigilant and prepared, act in a spirit of solidarity when Member States face crisis situations, and continue to work to improve our capacity to deal with crises, including all cases of instrumentalisation,\u201d urged the Portuguese leader. <\/p>\n

The second will focus on enlargement and reforms<\/strong>. Following on from the recent communication from the Berlaymont building entitled \u201cPreparing for a larger Union<\/a>\u201d \u2013 a pre-enlargement<\/a> package presented on 6 October through which Brussels is preparing its institutions, policies and budget for an EU that may soon have new members \u2013 the debate \u201cwill provide strategic guidance on the way forward.\u201d In particular, \u201cit will highlight the ongoing work on the accession treaty with Montenegro and the aim of concluding negotiations with that candidate country, hopefully by the end of the year,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

Finally, the Middle East. According to Costa, we need to return to discussing this issue. The talks will then \u2018take stock of the latest developments in the region, including their impact on freedom of navigation \u2013 a fundamental principle of international law \u2013 and on maritime security.\u2019 These are two \u201ccrucial aspects for global supply chains, particularly with regard to energy, fertilisers, and food,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In his traditional letter of invitation to the 27 EU leaders, the President of the European Council warned: \u201cAgainst a backdrop of growing geopolitical uncertainty, our next meeting will have a strong focus on the economy\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7908,"featured_media":467414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25705,25681],"tags":[27175,25871,26324,33240,27334,27335,31578,31782,29842],"class_list":["post-467425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-politics","tag-crisi-migrazione","tag-enlargement","tag-council-en","tag-crisis-middle-east-en","tag-qfp-en","tag-war-in-ucraine-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7908"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=467425"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":467426,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467425\/revisions\/467426"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/467414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=467425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=467425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=467425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}