BRUSSELS - A majority of European Union
lawmakers hoped to declare a "climate emergency" on Monday, a
week before a United Nations climate conference in Madrid.
Members of the European Parliament said the declaration
would increase pressure on the incoming EU executive, expected
to start work on December 1, to take a stronger leading role in the
global fight against climate change.
"The EU must act together and lead by example in
international climate negotiations through concrete actions and
measures," the centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D), the
second largest group of lawmakers in the parliament, said in a
statement.
They plan to pass the symbolic declaration during a debate
on the United Nations' COP25 climate summit, which opens on Dec.
2 in Madrid.
Lawmakers also stressed the declaration needed to be backed
up with action. "For me, it is not enough to declare a climate
emergency," Mohammed Chahim, the S&D's leading lawmaker on the
parliament's resolution ahead of the U.N. summit, told Reuters,
drawing the parallel to a house being on fire.
"This resolution to the COP25 is the water to put out the
fire," Chahim said, adding: "It is a message to the world: we do
not only want to be leaders, we are (also) taking the right
measures."
Other political groups backing the S&D proposal included the
Greens, the centrist Renew and the left-wing GUE, and it was
expected to pass with support from independent lawmakers.
The parliament has repeatedly pressed the European
Commission to take a stronger stance on climate change.
The new president of the executive Commission, Ursula von
der Leyen, has said combating climate change will be among her
top priorities and has set out a "European Green Deal" intended
to achieve "climate neutrality" - or adding no greenhouse gases
to the atmosphere beyond what can be absorbed - by 2050.
Current targets aim to cut the EU's greenhouse gas emissions
by 40% by 2030 from 1990 levels. Von der Leyen hopes to raise
the goal to at least 50%.
All but three of the EU's 28 member states have signed up to
this objective, but objections from Poland, Hungary and the
Czech Republic prevented the bloc promoting its stance at a UN climate action summit in September.
Several countries, regions and organisations have
symbolically declared a "climate emergency" to emphasise the
urgency of the issue.