Latest posts
The EU should encourage Public Transport in Cities
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Everywhere on earth metropolitan areas suffer from growing congestion. The situation is bound to become worse, especially in emerging countries, as everybody wants to have a car. More individual traffic cannot be the answer, not the electric car, not...
Put an end to State Visits with red Carpet within EU
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Monday, January 23rd 2012, the new Belgian Prime Minister di Rupo flew to Berlin for a one-hour working lunch with his German counterpart, Chancellor Merkel, to make her personal acquaintance and prepare for the European Council meeting on January 30...
EU is going ahead with stricter recycling of electric and electronic Waste
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After two years of intensive debating in the Council and EP the EU has cleared the path for more comprehensive recycling of the rising volume of electric and electronic waste. By 2020, 85 per cent of the electric and electronic equipment (refrigerato...
IMO starts addressing C02 emissions from maritime transport
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Maritime transport accounts for about three per cent of global C02 emissions, as much as air transport. In the absence of an effective international jurisdiction both transport modes have so far escaped an effective curb of their emissions. This situ...
EU tackles global emissions from air transport
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Since January 1st 2012, the EU is engaged in its most complex ever effort to mitigate international climate change: all aircraft landing and starting at EU airports will be subject to the EU emission cap and trading system that has been in force sinc...
Climate Change will accelerate unless Humanity acts speedily
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I. Climate change has become an intrinsic component of modern life. It is there every morning, everywhere on earth. Winters have become much milder than 30 years ago. The weather has become whimsical: we can no longer tell what temperatures will be l...
Global Warming will reduce C02 emissions in the northern Hemisphere
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In North America and Northern Europe roughly more than one third of CO2 emissions are due to heating, which is correlated to average temperatures from October to April. The latest estimates of the German aggregate energy consumption and CO2 emissions...
The EU must take the Leadership for a new Climate Compact
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The 17th International Climate Conference in Durban has terminated its two weeks` work with a procedural conclusion to work for an international climate agreement to be signed by 2015. This result owes much to the tenacity and negotiating skill of th...
German Power Revolution until 2022
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In 10 years Germany will have to do without nuclear power, which contributed 20 per cent to German electricity supply in 2010. Will Germany replace nuclear power essentially through coal and gas; or will it be able to make a big leap forward towards...
Time to put an end to the dispute between Macedonia and Greece
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Sometimes stupid conflicts between people, families or countries persist over many years because of intransigence of the parties or lack of proper outside mediators. The conflict between Greece and Macedonia is one of these. It lasts ever since the b...
Durban will not save the world
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Diplomatic conferences rarely end with a failure! Diplomats do not like being accused of failure. This goes in particular for long conferences with thousands of participants which cost millions of euro. The 17th international climate conference, COP...
The European Debt Crisis will prove a Blessing
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2011 will go into European history as an “annum horribilis”, fraught with panic, uncertainties and political ineptitude. But in five years from now it will also be praised as a year of major reforms that have consolidated the euro-zone and made t...
The EU can be proud of its low Corruption Level
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Since 1995 Transparency International, the Berlin-based, international non-governmental organisation, committed to the fight against corruption, has published global corruption reports, which rank the perceptions of corruption in 183 countries. The 2...
The View from Brussels
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The EU continues to be engrossed with the lack of fiscal stability and rising unemployment. And so far it has not discovered the right medicine to apply to this triptychon of ills. All other issues, from external policy to enlargement, neighbourhood,...
Pooling Public Bond Emissions of euro-zone countries
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EU countries would benefit from joint bond emissions to finance their public debt. Joint bonds would create a huge market comparable to that for US federal debt and enable governments to secure better terms thanks to higher liquidity. Joint bond emis...
Durban will be a non-event
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The 17th international climate conference (COP 17) that opened November 28 will not produce any worth while results. This is – unfortunately – a foregone conclusion whatever final declaration might be adopted at the closure in two weeks. The conf...
The Egyptian Army must come under Civilian Control
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Nine months since the toppling of President Mubarak Egypt continues to be more firmly than ever under control by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces. Contrary to earlier promises parliamentary elections did not take place in September but are now...
The ECB cannot substitute national efforts to balance budgets
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Euro-zone countries are presently engaged in a dispute about how to come to terms with excessive public debt levels. Before the start of the Euro-zone in 2001 EU member countries did not pay identical interest rates on public borrowing, Germany payin...
Poland is setting an example of good economic governance
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The re-elected Polish government is determined to tackle far-reaching economic and fiscal reforms in order to prepare the country for future uncertainties and challenges. It wants to put its public finances in order in view of joining the Euro-zone w...
The Arab League should remain adamant on Syria
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After having given a serious warning in mid-October to the Syrian regime and insisted on stopping violence against peaceful demonstrators the Arab League foreign ministers meeting in distant Morocco have decided to suspend Syrian membership as of Nov...
