- Germany will damage Europe's internal market by subsidizing consumers and businesses amid the energy crisis, Poland's premier said.
- Germany's €200 billion aid package has been criticized by leaders, with fears that subsidies will put firms in other nations at a disadvantage.
Germany will damage Europe's internal market by subsidizing consumers and businesses to protect them from the energy crisis, Poland's prime minister said.
That comes after Germany, which is the European Union's largest economy, earmarked €200 billion ($196 billion) to buffer the pain of soaring energy prices and supply shortages. The package includes an emergency brake on gas and electricity prices for consumers as well as tax cuts for gas companies.
But that aid package will put firms in other nations as a "big disadvantage," Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said at an EU summit on Friday.
"We are definitely against any attempts to damage the European internal market and the damage is going to happen if the German government will be able to go-alone with exclusively subsidizing its companies," Moraweicki said, per Bloomberg's report.
Other EU leaders have criticized the aid package, with Lithuania's president stating that the EU's 27 member states need to coordinate on the aid given to companies to keep competition fair.
The EU is scrambling to prepare for an energy crunch this winter, as demand rises while Russia has slashed supplies. EU leaders have been trying to negotiate a price cap on natural gas, but have failed to come to agreement so far, largely out of concern that the measure will make suppliers less willing to export gas to Europe.
"We have to know we're not the only customers in the," Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel said. "So we have to be very careful about decisions that we take that sound good on paper but where consequences can be problematic."