Athens: The pile of money that European governments owe their creditors grew again last year, and the fresh figures from the Union’s statistics office show how stubbornly the borrowing habit clings on even as the pandemic emergency fades into memory. In the euro area, government debt edged up to 87.8 percent of economic output at the end of 2025, from 87.0 percent a year earlier. Across the wider EU the ratio rose from 80.7 to 81.7 percent. The direction is modest but unmistakable: after a brief post-crisis dip, the line is pointing up. Behind the average lies a continent of sharp contrasts. Greece still carries the heaviest load at 146.1 percent of output, followed by Italy at 137.1, France at 115.6, Belgium at 107.9 and Spain at 100.7. At the other end sits Estonia, whose debt amounts to just 24.1 percent, a reminder that the Union contains both some of the most indebted and some of the most frugal treasuries in the developed world. In all, twelve member states carry debt above the 60 percent threshold written into the EU treaties decades ago. That threshold is more than a statistical curiosity. It anchors the bloc’s fiscal rulebook, recently overhauled to give governments multi-year paths back toward prudence rather than abrupt annual targets. The reformed framework was supposed to make consolidation more realistic and less politically explosive. The new numbers suggest the gravitational pull is still the wrong way: interest bills are climbing as cheap pandemic-era borrowing is refinanced at higher rates, and few governments have found the appetite to run the surpluses that would bend the curve down. The pressures pushing debt upward are not going away. Capitals are being asked to spend more on defence as the security picture darkens, to invest in grids and clean energy, and to cushion ageing populations whose pension and health costs rise every year. Each of those demands competes with the arithmetic of debt reduction. The Union’s own long-term budget talks, now getting under way, will test whether collective spending can relieve some of the strain on national books or simply add another layer to it. For investors, the spread between the safest and the shakiest sovereign borrowers remains the market’s running commentary on which governments are trusted to keep their promises. For citizens, the abstraction of a debt ratio translates into something concrete: every euro spent servicing old loans is a euro not spent on schools, hospitals or tax cuts. Statisticians are careful to note that a rising ratio is not automatically a crisis. Debt can be sustainable if economies grow and borrowing costs stay contained. But the latest reading lands as a quiet warning that Europe’s fiscal recovery is, at best, treading water, and that the hard work of bringing the numbers down has barely begun.