By Ayhan Simsek

BERLIN 

The German government adopted a new security strategy that embraces stronger international role for its armed forces together with EU partners on Wednesday.

German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said recent international challenges has made it necessary for Germany to develop a new security policy, compiled in a 83-page document known as the “White Paper”.

The main emphasis of the new strategy paper has been to strengthen EU’s capacity as a major actor in international security.

“For the first time, we have drafted concrete proposals on how to develop a European Security and Defense Union, as a long term goal,” von der Leyen told a press conference in Berlin on Wednesday.

She said NATO will continue to play a major role for Germany, but Berlin would also focus on deeper security cooperation among EU partners, by developing permanent cooperation mechanisms and strengthening the European defense industry.

Stressing that the new strategy was not a response to the U.K.’s decision to leave the EU, von der Leyen said the work for the White Paper had started long before the Brexit referendum.

But she also underlined that the U.K.’s exit from the 28-nation bloc might have a positive impact on developing closer defense ties among the EU member states.

“For many years we had to take into consideration the U.K., they consistently did not want progress on these topics” she said.

Germany began drawing a new policy guideline for the armed forces early last year and organized a number of meetings with the participation of international and national experts to discuss new security challenges.

“Our previous White Paper was adopted ten years ago. Since then the security environment has changed considerably, and of course Germany has changed as well,” von der Leyen said.

She claimed that recent challenges as Russia’s annexation of Crimea, terrorist attacks by Daesh, hybrid threat and the refugee crisis have made it necessary for Germany to assume a more active role for international security together with its allies and partners.

EU’s largest economy, Germany, is planning to spend € 130 billion in the next 15 years to meet the goals of the new military blueprint.

Besides the plan to strengthen defense industry, the roadmap also includes a new personnel strategy for the German armed forces, or Bundeswehr.

According to the plan, the Bundeswehr will try to recruit more people with different ethnic, cultural of religious backgrounds.

Von der Leyen said the Bundeswehr would also review possibilities of recruiting citizens of EU member states in the future.