De Sousa was speaking in Riga, before a ‘Future of Europe’ debate with other EU heads of state, on the second and final day of the 14th meeting of the Group of Arraiolos - an informal forum of EU presidents without executive powers, which first met in the Portuguese town of Arraiolos in 2003.
“Europe cannot waste time”, de Sousa said, stressing that urgent decisions were needed in areas such as migration and refugees.
Attending the meeting along with de Sousa and the president of the host country, Raimonds Vejonis, were the presidents of Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Italy, Malta and Poland.
The president of Hungary, which last week was the subject of an unprecedented vote of censure in the European Parliament, was not present.