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Luxembourg PM and EC President met to mobilize private capital for innovation and defense.

Public money alone will not be enough to make the investments the European economy needs. On that basis, there is broad agreement that the single market and the capital markets union should be developed further, with less red tape and a more business-friendly environment, according to PM Luc Frieden during Wednesday's meeting with European Council President António Costa in Luxembourg as part of Costa's ongoing tour of the EU's capitals.

If Europe wants to invest in innovation, Frieden said, if it wants a European artificial intelligence, and if it wants to invest in defence, public money will indeed be needed. Public money, however, is limited, and private capital will also have to play its part, he said. On that basis, he added, an agreement on the Savings and Investment Union should be reached by the end of the year.

Luxembourg would have an important role to play here through its financial centre, European Council President António Costa emphasised. The aim, he said, was to have an agreement on the table at EU level by the end of the year.

Another, more contested topic was the EU's Multiannual Financial Framework, or in other words the EU's budget for 2028–2034. Member states are split between those on the more frugal side of the argument and those who want to see a larger EU budget.

That, Frieden made clear at the press conference, is no easy assignment for Council President Costa. Costa nevertheless set himself the ambitious goal of hammering out a compromise at EU level by the end of the year.

This meant, he said, securing robust funding for the EU's new priorities, including defence, security, competitiveness, research, innovation, and strategic resilience, while preserving the essential pillars of support for Europe's regions, in particular cohesion and agricultural policy.

Luxembourg finds itself in the thick of the debate, as Frieden explained. Investment is needed, he said, but not on the back of new borrowing or fresh taxes. His remarks came against the backdrop of his firm rejection of the EU's proposed tobacco tax, as reported by POLITICO.

Also today

• Man has died after being found unresponsive in the Dudelange swimming pool.
• The Luxembourg Royals will travel to Oslo next Wednesday to attend the state funeral of the late Norwegian King Harald V.
• Former CFC president Paul Schmit celebrated an 80% drop in Luxembourg road deaths, falling from 132 in 1970 to 29 last year.
• UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham and French President Emmanuel Macron have held their first official talks, with migrant boats, Ukraine and British-EU relations high on the agenda.
• France joins Belgium and Britain in having recorded their hottest-ever summers after a season that scorched Europe.
• European lawmakers have demanded that the EU executive force Meta to change the "addictive" design of its platforms in Europe.

On air

Steps' record player was broken and John had to help him decipher the tracks he was looking to play!

Figure of the day

There have been 1,667 missing pets reported to police in five years.

• In a new parliamentary question, MP Claire Delcourt of the Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party (LSAP) has returned to the issue of missing pets, after raising similar concerns with the government in 2025. Back then, Delcourt's parliamentary question received the response that the police were primarily responsible for the safety of people, and the Grand Ducal Fire and Rescue Corps (CGDIS) for their rescue.
• Any intervention in connection with a missing animal would therefore only come into play in exceptional cases, in particular where there was a concrete danger stemming from the animal. According to MP Claire Delcourt, that leaves a situation in which "many affected people are left without clear guidance or support".

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