***Update 18 April: The Milan court hearing scheduled today on the Nigerian Ikebiri community's case against oil giant ENI/NAOC has been postponed as, both parties sought the court's permission to suspend the case to allow them to explore further the possibility of an out-of-court settlement that could end the conflict. We expect that the company will now offer adequate compensation and clean up according to the community's legitimate grievance. The court has agreed to set the next hearing for October 23, 2018.***
Following the elections in Honduras on Sunday November 26, causing a series of protests in which more than 20 people were killed and many more injured, Friends of the Earth Europe has called on the EU to act and not to recognise Juan Orlando Hernandez as Honduran President.
A spectacular nature haven in southwestern Bulgaria, home to twice as many butterfly species as the whole of the UK and protected by EU nature laws, is under threat from an illegal EU-funded motorway from Sofia to Greece.
The Bulgarian Government in October 2017 decided it will carve an international highway through the 16km-long Kresna Gorge, supported by hundreds of millions of EU taxpayer funds – in spite of an EU order to bypass the Gorge.
European Union ministers set a dangerous direction for the continent’s energy future at a summit in Brussels today. [1]
Energy ministers agreed to stick with the low target for renewable energy of 27% by 2030. This figure would actually mean a slow-down in the current growth of renewable energy, and was agreed despite Denmark and Portugal signaling that they wanted a higher target. [2]
By weakening definitions and provisions on citizen and community ownership, ministers turned their backs on European citizens’ chance to participate in and benefit from the energy transition.
More than two years since the European Commission launched its revised proposals to tackle resource use and waste in Europe, negotiations have come to an end and a new EU law to tackle waste for the next 20 years has been finalised.
The new law will ensure an improvement in waste management across Europe, but does not go far enough to fundamentally address Europe's overconsumption of resources and to reduce absolute waste generation.
Today, at a board meeting in Luxembourg the European Investment Bank (EIB) has decided, for now, to postpone loaning €1.5 billion to the controversial Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP).
Norway’s environmental minister Vidar Helgesen has just approved the biggest wolf hunt in Norway for a hundred years. Only 52-56 wolves live in Norway, but the minister wants 42 of them to be shot this winter, among them two important family packs in Osdalen and Julussa, near the border to Sweden. This is the second winter in a row that such a major cull has been allowed – but last year’s was prevented after a major popular and international outcry.
Next week EU Member States will discuss and may vote on a proposal from the European Commission to ban bee harming neonicotinoid pesticides on all crops outdoors.
This would be a huge step forwards to help combat the worrying decline of bees and other insects, and increase protection for our pollinators.
Our current level of overconsumption is plundering the Earth's resources at a faster rate than they can be regenerated. This cannot last forever – and we are beginning to see the impacts of the system breaking down. Not only at the environmental level, but also at the social one. The number of murdered environmental defenders is increasing by the year, as the overexploitation of natural resources threatens local communities, especially in the global South.
