
Greece will ask the European Commission to exempt its 2026 defense spending from the EU’s budget rules as part of the so-called fiscal escape clause, the Greek Finance Minister said Tuesday. Speaking to public broadcaster ERT, Kyriakos Pierrakakis said the country will submit a request later on Tuesday, seeking to exempt 500 million euros ($586 million) in defense spending from Greece’s 2026 budget. That’s less than 0.3 percent of Greece’s GDP. The European Commission has proposed allowing its 27-member states to raise defense spending by 1.5 percent of their GDP (Gross Domestic Product) each year for four years, without any of the disciplinary steps that would normally kick in after a member’s deficit rises above 3 percent.