Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron discussed guidelines for common defense and foreign policy and reached a compromise on the issue of arms exports.
After a long struggle, Berlin and Paris agreed in principle on common rules for sales of weapon systems. There was an "important agreement" that was legally binding, Macron said at a press conference with Merkel after the Franco-German Council of Ministers.
According to a statement, the last steps of the agreement that has now been reached should be implemented as soon as possible. The statement did not give details of the agreement.
According to Merkel, in joint projects there is a so-called de minimis rule if components of one country are used in an armaments project of the other country. Previously, the AFP news agency had reported on a possible compromise line: According to Germany should not block exports of French defense equipment in the future, if they contain less than 20 percent German components. But that was not confirmed.
The goal is an agreement "for a long time", but in which it will not go specifically to individual countries, Merkel said. She assumes that the SPD will agree to the new agreement on arms exports. It was "negotiated by the foreign ministers, so it could not be negotiated against the will of the SPD". The agreement will still be in the cabinet topic and must be decided there.
The agreement should help settle a dispute between Paris and Berlin over the stricter German arms export rules. The federal government had stopped arms exports to Saudi Arabia in October 2018 because of the killing of Saudi Arabian agents on journalist Jamal Khashoggi, but not France.
No progress for EU candidate in the Western Balkans
The agreement is also considered central to two major projects in which the heads of government reaffirmed unity: the joint German-French development of a battle tank and a new fighter plane. Both projects were considered endangered by the different ways of handling arms exports. Merkel hinted that a joint armament development was possible in future, for which the German-French-dominated aircraft manufacturer Airbus could serve as a model.
The heads of state agreed in principle, among others, on animal welfare, climate protection, trade and copyright law and EU enlargement in the Western Balkans. The settlements were recorded in the so-called Toulouse Declaration, Macon said.
Both leaders praised the efforts and progress made by EU contenders North Macedonia and Albania. The Chancellor was sympathetic to France's reservations about the accession process. Macron stressed the importance of a possible "reversibility" of an accession negotiation once opened. Before discussing new accessions, the process needed to be restructured.
France, together with the Netherlands and Denmark, prevented the launching of EU accession negotiations with North Macedonia and Albania on Tuesday at a ministerial meeting.
Cooperation of the federal police, end of the chickens killing
The interior ministers of both countries also agreed to closer cooperation between their police forces in the Council of Ministers. The German Federal Police and the French Gendarmerie National are now working together in a single mission unit.
Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) and his French counterpart Christophe Castaner signed an agreement. Seehofer called the group in a communication "a reservoir of expertise and competence that our population can rely on".
The unit is designed to assist national police forces in the event of disasters, major disasters and major border events. The two states had already agreed in 2017 on the formation of the group. Ten police officers from each country were trained together to form the first cast of the group.
But they do not sit together on a watch: it is a so-called virtual unit, which is contracted on an occasion-related basis.
Both countries also want to get out of the controversial mass killing of male chicks together. The agreed Federal Agriculture Minister Julia Klöckner (CDU) and her colleague Didier Guillaume. According to the German Ministry, a timetable should also be agreed. The goal is to finish the killing until the end of 2021.