“The idea was that the three presidents … They wanted to celebrate Schuman’s day together with Prime Minister Luc Frieden in Luxembourg. Due to the programming limitations of the three presidents and the prime minister, the only travel option to allow everyone to attend the commemoration of Schuman’s statement together was to take a Carter flight,” Pinho said during a daily session on Monday.

“This is justified because it was really exceptional and it was the only way to ensure that the three presidents could be present,” he added. “And it is obviously considerably faster than if you take the car.”

This is not the first time that the leaders of private leaders by EU leaders have generated criticism in Brussels, especially because the EU promotes the greenest transport and aims to reduce institutional emissions online with their climate objectives.

In March 2023, the German media Bild and Der Spiegel reported that the president of the commission had taken 57 private flights in just two years.

Before assuming his current role as president of the Council, Costa faced similar scrutiny in Portugal. In June 2023, the opposition parties questioned their use of a Portuguese aircraft of the Falcon 50 Air Force for a trip to Brussels, claiming that it may have had personal purposes. The government replied that the plane was properly used for the official transport of high -ranking officials.

In March 2023, Politico revealed that former President of the Council Charles Michel had used rented air taxis in 28 of the 46 foreign trips he made during 2022, even to the COP27 conversations in Egypt in 2022 and the Cop26 summit in Glasgow in 2021.

Unlike many national governments, the EU does not maintain its own fleet of airplanes to transport officials. On the other hand, it is based on commercial airlines or rented flights for official trips, which makes such arrangements more visible and controversial.