- From historic to disappointing: the decisions of Sharm el-Sheikh
- IRIS2: rocket propulsion for the economy
- Ecodesign: agreement on specifications for tablets and smartphones
- AI Act still about details
- EU sets anti-dumping duties on coated steel imports
- German LNG terminals cost more than twice as much
- Opinion: Media Freedom Act
Nothing stands in the way of Donald Trump’s comeback. Fortunately, we’re not talking about a return to the White House but to the online platform Twitter. In a vote, a majority had spoken out in favor of giving Trump access to his account again. Elon Musk respects the will of the majority. But Trump is hesitant. It’s quite possible that he no longer trusts Twitter services since the chaos regarding the checkmark. After all, Trump wants to have control over the fake news spread under his name.
The sleep deprivation of the night spent negotiating is followed by the COP 27 hangover. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen expresses dissatisfaction with the meager results in Sharm el-Sheikh. “A small step towards climate justice was taken with COP27, but the planet needs much more,” she says. “We have treated a few symptoms, but not cured the patient of their fever.” Lukas Scheid sat through the last night of negotiations on the Red Sea and wrote up the results for us.
From Sharm el-Sheikh to space: Corinna Visser has been following up on the deal that EU co-legislators struck last week for a satellite-based secure communications network. Space Commissioner Thierry Breton has lined up €2.4 billion in budgetary funding for IRIS2, underlining his reputation as a doer: The agreement was reached in a record-breaking nine months.
Not Breton, but the Commissioner for the European Way of Life, Margaritis Schinas, is leaving for the World Cup in Qatar in the very first week. In today’s Apéro, Falk Steiner criticizes EU politicians’ handling of the sheikhs’ football event in the desert sand: lacking in credibility to a shocking degree.
Have a great start to the week!
Markus Grabitz
Feature
From historic to disappointing: the decisions of Sharm el-Sheikh
Just a week ago – at the halfway point of COP27 – it was considered almost impossible that a fund for loss & damage would come to be. Now it has been decided and is to come next year. It is a historic decision, as developing countries have been calling for a financial instrument to address loss and damage resulting from climate change for 30 years. Christoph Bals, political director of Germanwatch called it an important breakthrough. He says the German government was instrumental in getting the EU and other industrialized countries to warm up to this fund.
Loss & damage: historical agreement
The agreement on loss & damage at COP27 includes:
- A new fund for particularly vulnerable developing countries
- Other financing measures outside the fund
- New additional funding from a variety of sources, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund
- The establishment of a transition committee to clarify details and make proposals between now and COP28
On Sunday night, there was still wrangling over whether only “particularly vulnerable” developing countries or all developing countries should be eligible to receive funds from the loss and damage financial instruments. A formulation that classified all developing countries as of 1992 as recipient countries was dropped shortly before the closing plenary of the COP.
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