The Federal Assembly yesterday confirmed Frank-Walter Steinmeier as Federal President with a broad majority for another five years. After his re-election, he used the first speech for clear words to Vladimir Putin, whom he blamed for the escalation in the Ukraine conflict. At the same time, he appealed to the Russian president: “Help us find a way to keep the peace in Europe!”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is heading to Kiev today to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Scholz is expected to pledge further economic support to Ukraine. He then will travel to Moscow for talks with Putin on Tuesday morning. His travels are accompanied by growing concerns about a Russian invasion of Ukraine. German politicians are less vocal than the US government in their warnings, but they also consider the situation to be dire. Nevertheless, German government circles are at pains not to give the impression that Scholz’s visit is the last chance to avert war.
Against the backdrop of a looming threat of war in Ukraine, the draft final report of the INGE Special Committee takes on added poignancy. The committee’s goal is to look for evidence of foreign interference in democratic processes and institutions and to develop counterstrategies. The conclusion is that the EU is too careless about foreign interference . China, for example, is increasingly successful in using top politicians for its own purposes – following the example of Russia, which can count on the loyal support of former Chancellor Schröder. The committee also calls for the EU’s Code of Practice on Disinformation to be tightened up – a point that is likely to cause controversy, as Eric Bonse writes.
The tightening of CO2 fleet limits for cars and vans is one of the most controversial dossiers in the Fit for 55 package. The limits set emission reduction targets for an automaker’s entire fleet of new cars. But the EU Parliament’s rapporteurs are not only wrestling over the level of the limits and the date when fleets should be emission-free. They are also discussing the inclusion of e-fuels within the limits and bans on particularly dirty cars. One Green parliamentarian is even calling for the end of combustion engine SUVs from 2025. Lukas Scheid breaks down who is calling for which reduction targets and takes a closer look at some of the proposals.
The European Parliament calls for more action in the fight against disinformation, foreign interference, and elite capture. The EU must introduce its own sanctions regime against disinformation and ensure that Russia cannot recruit top politicians such as Gerhard Schröder or François Fillon in the future and use them for its own purposes, said the chairman of the INGE Committee, Raphaël Glucksmann (S&D, France).
The INGE Special Committee was established in June 2020 to seek evidence of foreign interference in democratic processes and institutions and to develop counterstrategies. It has been active for 18 months and has undertaken its own research, such as a high-profile trip to Taiwan. Last week, the rapporteur, Sandra Kalniete (EPP, Latvia), presented the draft final report.
Against the backdrop of the growing threat of war in Ukraine, this report now takes on a particularly explosive character. The EU accuses Russia of destabilizing Ukraine with targeted false reports and preparing for an invasion. Most recently, the European External Action Service (EEAS) had also sounded the alarm. “Pro-Kremlin media are fueling tensions around Ukraine,” reads the newsletter of the EEAS task force against disinformation.
The INGE Committee completed its report before the recent escalation. Unlike the task force, it does not focus on Russian propaganda but also addresses attempted influence from the US, China, Turkey, or Azerbaijan. The EU is still far too careless about foreign interference, the final report says. China is increasingly emulating Russia and is particularly successful in “capturing elites”, Glucksmann warns.
In addition to Schröder and Fillon, who work for the Russian energy companies Gazprom and Zaroubejneft, respectively, the report also mentions former French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, who actively supports Chinese interests. Even a former EU commissioner, Štefan Füle, had allowed himself to be roped in for Beijing.
“What Fillon, Schröder, and many other Western politicians are doing across all countries and parties is bad,” Glucksmann said. He said the EU must clearly state the problem and put a stop to it, for example, through legally mandated “cooling-off” periods or an ethics committee. Negotiations on such an ethics committee are already underway between the European Parliament and the EU Commission – but so far without any tangible success.
The INGE Committee’s call for a separate sanctions regime for disinformation and manipulation has little chance of success. According to EU foreign affairs representative Josep Borrell, there is no legal basis for this. In addition, one should not intervene too deeply in the freedom of the media and opinion. She does not want a “Ministry of Truth”, emphasizes the responsible EU Commissioner Věra Jourová.
The MEPs’ call to tighten up the EU’s Code of Practice on Disinformation is likely to cause controversy. The draft report states that the code of practice is not transparent and is far too non-binding. It is based only on agreements between the EU Commission and major platforms such as Facebook. The INGE Committee and other important stakeholders, on the other hand, were not consulted.
Therefore, the Parliament is “deeply concerned”, write Kalniete and Glucksmann. Informal self-regulation is not enough. What is needed is an “effective overview, assessment, and sanctions mechanism. This applies not only to the Code of Practice on Disinformation but also to the Digital Services Act, the Digital Markets Act, and other measures in connection with the European Democracy Action Plan.
The INGE report is to be adopted in the plenary session of the European Parliament in March. Twenty-five committee members voted in favor of the draft, eight were against it. Clare Daly (GUE/NGL, Ireland) cast a special vote. The report unduly inflates the threat from Russia and China, she criticized. It could be used to restrict freedom of expression in the EU.
It was to be expected that an agreement would not be easy. The positions of the various camps are too far apart. The draft report on CO2 fleet limits for passenger cars and vans by Renew rapporteur Jan Huitema had already stirred up tempers (Europe.Table reported). The amendments submitted – more than 650 in total – show once again that there is still a long way to go before a majority can adopt a parliamentary report.
The essential problem with the Huitema report is that it is already a compromise along the lines of conflict between the other two major camps and their shadow rapporteurs – that of the Greens around Dutchman Bas Eickhout and that of the EPP around CDU politician Jens Gieseke. Eickhout’s amendments mainly provide for an increase in the ambition level of the fleet limit values. With an average lifespan of around 15 years, it must be ensured that all new vehicles coming onto the market from 2030 onwards are completely emission-free, Eickhout demands. The Commission and Huitema had set 2035 as the end date for the internal combustion engine.
Gieseke and a group of members of the Renew parliamentary group – including FDP man Andreas Glück – have moved that the relevant paragraph be deleted from the Commission proposal altogether. This would mean that the stipulated phase-out of internal combustion engines would be off the table. The Renew group argues that it is not the drive technology but the fuel that gives cause for concern. It advocates not closing one’s mind to any technology prematurely, since one “does not know what the future holds”. The proposal: not to set the end date for the internal combustion engine until the next review of fleet limits.
Gieseke also calls for “technological neutrality” as a guiding principle for fleet limits. “Not the state, but free competition and thus ultimately the consumer should decide which technology will prevail,” he told Europe.Table. He said he was not interested in using rules to favor or disadvantage a particular drive system. “Instead, we should be open to innovation and give our companies enough room for research and development.”
Gieseke’s amendments, therefore, refer to the consideration of low-CO2 and CO2-neutral fuels – i.e., synthetic fuels such as e-fuels. This would mean that car manufacturers could continue to rely on internal combustion engines. Gieseke calls for fleet limits to be accompanied by a European strategy for upscaling e-fuels to keep jobs in the automotive industry in Europe. Failure to do so risks “the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs without achieving any real benefit for the climate.”
According to Gieseke, car manufacturers should be able to count their CO2 savings from the use of e-fuels toward their fleet targets. In addition, member states should certify the amount of e-fuels that a car manufacturer puts on the market each year so that manufacturers can have them credited. He also calls for emissions not to be measured solely at the tailpipe. Instead, he proposes a holistic, lifecycle-based calculation that also considers the materials used in production and the energy mix of the country in question.
Eickhout counters. The end date for the internal combustion engine is the “only way to ensure that the entire EU vehicle fleet can become completely emission-free by 2050”. And he goes even further, calling for more and significantly higher annual reduction targets for the years 2025 to 2030. Eickhout argues that higher reduction targets would spur innovation and that reductions should be measured in tailpipe emissions rather than the fuel used.
In addition, he wants member states to be able to oblige companies with a certain fleet size to switch to a completely zero-emission fleet by 2027 at the latest. In doing so, he also wants to boost the used car market for EVs. To this end, Eickhout wants to eliminate the weight adjustment factor. This reduces CO2 reduction targets for automakers if they sell heavier vehicles. The Green politician says this “perverse incentive” has boosted sales of more polluting vehicles such as SUVs.
Instead, he calls for fleet limits to encourage downsizing and lightweighting of vehicles, regardless of fuel or engine type. According to Eickhout, vehicles with CO2 emissions of more than 120g per kilometer should be banned in the EU from 2025 – this would effectively affect all SUVs with internal combustion engines.
The rapporteurs will now negotiate until mid-May, after which a vote will be taken in the ENVI Committee before the report is submitted to the plenary in June.
The emergence of new digital technologies requires new legal and sociopolitical rules, says Lorena Jaume-Palasí. The founder of the nonprofit initiative The Ethical Tech Society researches the ethics of digitization and automation and addresses questions of legal philosophy in this context.
She has been appointed as a member of expert councils of the Spanish government in the field of digitalization in two legislatures: in 2017 as a member of the Council of Wise Men for Artificial Intelligence and Data Policy and in 2020 as a member of the National Council for Artificial Intelligence. In 2020, she was also appointed as a member of the International Advisory Council (2020-2024) by the European Parliament’s Section for Science and Technology (STOA).
Jaume-Palasí was born in Mallorca and lives in Berlin. She studied Romance Studies and New and Modern History at Freie Universität and Romance Studies and Political Science at Humboldt University in Berlin. Her interest in digitization began when she realized that ethical or legal criteria were not readily applicable to the digital world.
She says the meaning of spatial realities and privacy change as we interact in digital space. “The concept of privacy is something that is constantly evolving. In times of digitalization, creating a new space – the digital space – you first have to understand what kind of space it is,” says Jaume-Palasí in an interview with Europe.Table.
The scientist points out that democracy, law, and technology share a common individualistic perspective: The individual should be protected and provided with the greatest opportunities for development. However, the friction between law and technology arises from this commonality, says Jaume-Palasí: “AI does not know the individual, but it helps to gain insights into general behavioral patterns of a population.” Everything that concerns the collective dimension of society is underdeveloped in the legal sense.
“We need more instruments for the area of public interest, for the social dimension of society,” says the researcher. This is necessary not only in the area of digitization but also in the areas of sustainability – the environment is a classic example – security, stability, and social cohesion.
It is important to understand what digital technology can and cannot do. “Every new technology introduced in the past has raised a number of moral and legal issues,” Jaume-Palasí says. The invention of printing and the translation of the Bible were technologies that the church and the monarchy sought to control “in a repressive sense” because they were technologies “that could challenge established power”.
AI is the child of enlightenment. It is important for regulators to understand the implications of the technology and not regulate it regardless of the social context. Isabel Cuesta Camacho
The Federal Assembly yesterday confirmed Frank-Walter Steinmeier as Federal President with a broad majority for another five years. After his re-election, he used the first speech for clear words to Vladimir Putin, whom he blamed for the escalation in the Ukraine conflict. At the same time, he appealed to the Russian president: “Help us find a way to keep the peace in Europe!”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is heading to Kiev today to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Scholz is expected to pledge further economic support to Ukraine. He then will travel to Moscow for talks with Putin on Tuesday morning. His travels are accompanied by growing concerns about a Russian invasion of Ukraine. German politicians are less vocal than the US government in their warnings, but they also consider the situation to be dire. Nevertheless, German government circles are at pains not to give the impression that Scholz’s visit is the last chance to avert war.
Against the backdrop of a looming threat of war in Ukraine, the draft final report of the INGE Special Committee takes on added poignancy. The committee’s goal is to look for evidence of foreign interference in democratic processes and institutions and to develop counterstrategies. The conclusion is that the EU is too careless about foreign interference . China, for example, is increasingly successful in using top politicians for its own purposes – following the example of Russia, which can count on the loyal support of former Chancellor Schröder. The committee also calls for the EU’s Code of Practice on Disinformation to be tightened up – a point that is likely to cause controversy, as Eric Bonse writes.
The tightening of CO2 fleet limits for cars and vans is one of the most controversial dossiers in the Fit for 55 package. The limits set emission reduction targets for an automaker’s entire fleet of new cars. But the EU Parliament’s rapporteurs are not only wrestling over the level of the limits and the date when fleets should be emission-free. They are also discussing the inclusion of e-fuels within the limits and bans on particularly dirty cars. One Green parliamentarian is even calling for the end of combustion engine SUVs from 2025. Lukas Scheid breaks down who is calling for which reduction targets and takes a closer look at some of the proposals.
The European Parliament calls for more action in the fight against disinformation, foreign interference, and elite capture. The EU must introduce its own sanctions regime against disinformation and ensure that Russia cannot recruit top politicians such as Gerhard Schröder or François Fillon in the future and use them for its own purposes, said the chairman of the INGE Committee, Raphaël Glucksmann (S&D, France).
The INGE Special Committee was established in June 2020 to seek evidence of foreign interference in democratic processes and institutions and to develop counterstrategies. It has been active for 18 months and has undertaken its own research, such as a high-profile trip to Taiwan. Last week, the rapporteur, Sandra Kalniete (EPP, Latvia), presented the draft final report.
Against the backdrop of the growing threat of war in Ukraine, this report now takes on a particularly explosive character. The EU accuses Russia of destabilizing Ukraine with targeted false reports and preparing for an invasion. Most recently, the European External Action Service (EEAS) had also sounded the alarm. “Pro-Kremlin media are fueling tensions around Ukraine,” reads the newsletter of the EEAS task force against disinformation.
The INGE Committee completed its report before the recent escalation. Unlike the task force, it does not focus on Russian propaganda but also addresses attempted influence from the US, China, Turkey, or Azerbaijan. The EU is still far too careless about foreign interference, the final report says. China is increasingly emulating Russia and is particularly successful in “capturing elites”, Glucksmann warns.
In addition to Schröder and Fillon, who work for the Russian energy companies Gazprom and Zaroubejneft, respectively, the report also mentions former French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, who actively supports Chinese interests. Even a former EU commissioner, Štefan Füle, had allowed himself to be roped in for Beijing.
“What Fillon, Schröder, and many other Western politicians are doing across all countries and parties is bad,” Glucksmann said. He said the EU must clearly state the problem and put a stop to it, for example, through legally mandated “cooling-off” periods or an ethics committee. Negotiations on such an ethics committee are already underway between the European Parliament and the EU Commission – but so far without any tangible success.
The INGE Committee’s call for a separate sanctions regime for disinformation and manipulation has little chance of success. According to EU foreign affairs representative Josep Borrell, there is no legal basis for this. In addition, one should not intervene too deeply in the freedom of the media and opinion. She does not want a “Ministry of Truth”, emphasizes the responsible EU Commissioner Věra Jourová.
The MEPs’ call to tighten up the EU’s Code of Practice on Disinformation is likely to cause controversy. The draft report states that the code of practice is not transparent and is far too non-binding. It is based only on agreements between the EU Commission and major platforms such as Facebook. The INGE Committee and other important stakeholders, on the other hand, were not consulted.
Therefore, the Parliament is “deeply concerned”, write Kalniete and Glucksmann. Informal self-regulation is not enough. What is needed is an “effective overview, assessment, and sanctions mechanism. This applies not only to the Code of Practice on Disinformation but also to the Digital Services Act, the Digital Markets Act, and other measures in connection with the European Democracy Action Plan.
The INGE report is to be adopted in the plenary session of the European Parliament in March. Twenty-five committee members voted in favor of the draft, eight were against it. Clare Daly (GUE/NGL, Ireland) cast a special vote. The report unduly inflates the threat from Russia and China, she criticized. It could be used to restrict freedom of expression in the EU.
It was to be expected that an agreement would not be easy. The positions of the various camps are too far apart. The draft report on CO2 fleet limits for passenger cars and vans by Renew rapporteur Jan Huitema had already stirred up tempers (Europe.Table reported). The amendments submitted – more than 650 in total – show once again that there is still a long way to go before a majority can adopt a parliamentary report.
The essential problem with the Huitema report is that it is already a compromise along the lines of conflict between the other two major camps and their shadow rapporteurs – that of the Greens around Dutchman Bas Eickhout and that of the EPP around CDU politician Jens Gieseke. Eickhout’s amendments mainly provide for an increase in the ambition level of the fleet limit values. With an average lifespan of around 15 years, it must be ensured that all new vehicles coming onto the market from 2030 onwards are completely emission-free, Eickhout demands. The Commission and Huitema had set 2035 as the end date for the internal combustion engine.
Gieseke and a group of members of the Renew parliamentary group – including FDP man Andreas Glück – have moved that the relevant paragraph be deleted from the Commission proposal altogether. This would mean that the stipulated phase-out of internal combustion engines would be off the table. The Renew group argues that it is not the drive technology but the fuel that gives cause for concern. It advocates not closing one’s mind to any technology prematurely, since one “does not know what the future holds”. The proposal: not to set the end date for the internal combustion engine until the next review of fleet limits.
Gieseke also calls for “technological neutrality” as a guiding principle for fleet limits. “Not the state, but free competition and thus ultimately the consumer should decide which technology will prevail,” he told Europe.Table. He said he was not interested in using rules to favor or disadvantage a particular drive system. “Instead, we should be open to innovation and give our companies enough room for research and development.”
Gieseke’s amendments, therefore, refer to the consideration of low-CO2 and CO2-neutral fuels – i.e., synthetic fuels such as e-fuels. This would mean that car manufacturers could continue to rely on internal combustion engines. Gieseke calls for fleet limits to be accompanied by a European strategy for upscaling e-fuels to keep jobs in the automotive industry in Europe. Failure to do so risks “the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs without achieving any real benefit for the climate.”
According to Gieseke, car manufacturers should be able to count their CO2 savings from the use of e-fuels toward their fleet targets. In addition, member states should certify the amount of e-fuels that a car manufacturer puts on the market each year so that manufacturers can have them credited. He also calls for emissions not to be measured solely at the tailpipe. Instead, he proposes a holistic, lifecycle-based calculation that also considers the materials used in production and the energy mix of the country in question.
Eickhout counters. The end date for the internal combustion engine is the “only way to ensure that the entire EU vehicle fleet can become completely emission-free by 2050”. And he goes even further, calling for more and significantly higher annual reduction targets for the years 2025 to 2030. Eickhout argues that higher reduction targets would spur innovation and that reductions should be measured in tailpipe emissions rather than the fuel used.
In addition, he wants member states to be able to oblige companies with a certain fleet size to switch to a completely zero-emission fleet by 2027 at the latest. In doing so, he also wants to boost the used car market for EVs. To this end, Eickhout wants to eliminate the weight adjustment factor. This reduces CO2 reduction targets for automakers if they sell heavier vehicles. The Green politician says this “perverse incentive” has boosted sales of more polluting vehicles such as SUVs.
Instead, he calls for fleet limits to encourage downsizing and lightweighting of vehicles, regardless of fuel or engine type. According to Eickhout, vehicles with CO2 emissions of more than 120g per kilometer should be banned in the EU from 2025 – this would effectively affect all SUVs with internal combustion engines.
The rapporteurs will now negotiate until mid-May, after which a vote will be taken in the ENVI Committee before the report is submitted to the plenary in June.
The emergence of new digital technologies requires new legal and sociopolitical rules, says Lorena Jaume-Palasí. The founder of the nonprofit initiative The Ethical Tech Society researches the ethics of digitization and automation and addresses questions of legal philosophy in this context.
She has been appointed as a member of expert councils of the Spanish government in the field of digitalization in two legislatures: in 2017 as a member of the Council of Wise Men for Artificial Intelligence and Data Policy and in 2020 as a member of the National Council for Artificial Intelligence. In 2020, she was also appointed as a member of the International Advisory Council (2020-2024) by the European Parliament’s Section for Science and Technology (STOA).
Jaume-Palasí was born in Mallorca and lives in Berlin. She studied Romance Studies and New and Modern History at Freie Universität and Romance Studies and Political Science at Humboldt University in Berlin. Her interest in digitization began when she realized that ethical or legal criteria were not readily applicable to the digital world.
She says the meaning of spatial realities and privacy change as we interact in digital space. “The concept of privacy is something that is constantly evolving. In times of digitalization, creating a new space – the digital space – you first have to understand what kind of space it is,” says Jaume-Palasí in an interview with Europe.Table.
The scientist points out that democracy, law, and technology share a common individualistic perspective: The individual should be protected and provided with the greatest opportunities for development. However, the friction between law and technology arises from this commonality, says Jaume-Palasí: “AI does not know the individual, but it helps to gain insights into general behavioral patterns of a population.” Everything that concerns the collective dimension of society is underdeveloped in the legal sense.
“We need more instruments for the area of public interest, for the social dimension of society,” says the researcher. This is necessary not only in the area of digitization but also in the areas of sustainability – the environment is a classic example – security, stability, and social cohesion.
It is important to understand what digital technology can and cannot do. “Every new technology introduced in the past has raised a number of moral and legal issues,” Jaume-Palasí says. The invention of printing and the translation of the Bible were technologies that the church and the monarchy sought to control “in a repressive sense” because they were technologies “that could challenge established power”.
AI is the child of enlightenment. It is important for regulators to understand the implications of the technology and not regulate it regardless of the social context. Isabel Cuesta Camacho
