- Forest fires: EU calls for more powers in civil protection
- Sharp criticism of Commission idea for content tolls
- EU Commissioner Gentiloni outlines alternatives to VAT exemption
- Lithuania and Denmark call for Europe-wide tourist visas ban for Russians
- Eurozone economy grew by 0.6 percent in spring
- Energy-saving plan cuts Spain’s power consumption by almost 4 percent
- Study: Europe can meet its own demand for EV batteries
- Hannah Neumann – a pragmatic idealist
Thousands of hectares of European forest fall victim to fire every year, and the trend is rising. The EU’s emergency response had to support overwhelmed member states in fighting the fires more and more often. Janez Lenarčič, EU Commissioner for Crisis Management, therefore recently called for more extensive powers for the Commission. Germany, however, sees no need for a change. Timo Landenberger has the details.
For weeks, there have been whispers that the EU Commission wants to force Netflix, Google, Facebook and others to pay more for European network expansion – a proposal will be presented this fall. But now a growing number of stakeholders warn that this idea could backfire. Germany’s Minister for Digital and Transport, Volker Wissing, wants one particular area to be left untouched. Falk Steiner explains the complicated debate.
Yesterday, Eurostat published the spring’s economic growth figures in the eurozone. They show that the economy did not grow as strongly as expected, as you can read in the News.
Pragmatism and idealism rarely go hand in hand. For Hannah Neumann, things are a little different. The 38-year-old MEP for the Greens/EFA would rather put the money spent on the military into climate protection, but the situation is what it is. Ella Joyner presents a Profile of the peace and conflict researcher.
Lisa-Martina Klein
Feature
Forest fires: EU calls for more civil protection powers
More than 2250 forest fires were recorded by the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) in the EU between January and mid-August 2022. Almost twice as many as in the entire past year and an increase of about 230 percent compared to the annual average of the last decade. Around 660,000 hectares of land have already burned – a new record, and this even before the end of the forest fire season.
The effects of climate change are becoming increasingly noticeable and forest fires are no longer a southern phenomenon. In Central Europe, too, flames are destroying thousands of hectares of forest, endangering the environment and the population. The EU states are finding themselves increasingly overwhelmed by the scale of the situation and are requesting assistance via the EU’s Civil Protection Mechanism.
Eight such requests for assistance have already been made this year, the EU Commission reported. The requests came from Portugal, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Albania, and most recently, France. Helpers from Germany, Greece, Sweden, Poland, Austria, Romania and Italy are helping to fight the flames. Six firefighting aircraft from Sweden, Greece and Italy are currently in action.
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