The EU must change its tune on
migrants or Italy's budget veto will be "certain", Deputy
Premier Luigi Di Maio said Monday.
Di Maio was speaking after European Budget Commissioner
Guenther Oettinger said Monday that Italy doesn't pay 20 billion
euros a year to the EU budget as stated by Di Maio in
threatening to cut it unless the EU took in migrants, but 14-16
billion.
"Taking into account what it receives from the EU budget that
leaves a net contribution of three billion a year," Oettinger
said.
Di Maio replied that Oettinger's description of his claim as
a "farce" "shows what consideration they have of our country".
"They're evidently used to Italian premiers and ministers
going cap in hand to Brussels".
"Funding is not a dogma," said Di Maio, leader of the
anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, and also industry and labour
minister.
"The music in Europe is going to change," he said, saying
that soon there would be talk of "real solidarity and not
restrictions that are unsustainable from both the social and
economic standpoint".
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