Brussels, 30/03/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Monday 30 March, MEPs and national parliamentarians expressed their desire to ensure the success of the United Nations' climate conference, COP 21, in December this year. The European Parliament's environment committee, chaired by Giovanni La Via (EPP, Italy), invited the politicians to Brussels for a two-part inter-parliamentary discussion on 1) the challenges and role of European diplomacy ahead of the Paris summit; and 2) how to achieve a resource-efficient, low-carbon and innovative Europe from COP 21 to 2050.
La Via said that the European Parliament wanted to play a role in climate diplomacy and would be sending a delegation to Paris. Speaking with a single voice in backing the EU's commitment to collectively reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 40% by 2030 compared with the 1990 figures, mobilising support from and the participation of civil society, promoting partnerships with local authorities, ensuring the follow-up to the Paris agreement and possibly passing a new climate law are the key ideas that punctuated early contributions. Finnish MPs were praised by their colleagues for recently passing a framework law on the monitoring of climate commitments.
Miguel Arias Canete, EU Climate Action and Energy Commissioner, said he was expecting a lot from the parliamentarians. He said the EU had shown that green growth is possible, thanks to the active commitment of Europe's parliaments and that, after the Paris summit, national parliaments and the European Parliament will need to ratify the global agreement and the Commission would keep them informed. He said Europe had to speak with one voice and parliamentarians were the EU's ambassadors when discussing with their international counterparts. This, he said is true about issues connected with Paris as well, but Paris would not regulate climate change. He said it was a turning point and Paris would continue, adding that debates at the European Parliament and the world at large would only just be beginning. He said he would discuss with international partners how a robust and resilient agreement can be reached, pointing out the importance of sticking to submission timelines. He regretted that only the EU, Switzerland, Norway and Mexico had submitted their proposals and he congratulated Mexico on being the first emerging economy to do so. He hoped China, the United States and the other G20 nations would now follow suit. (Aminata Niang)