MEPs from the Parliament’s environment and foreign affairs committees are on the same page when it comes to the need and the ways to step up the EU’s climate diplomacy, the triple objective is to promote climate action globally, to help implement the Paris agreement and to prevent climate change-related conflict.
This is made clear by the draft resolution they adopted by 90 votes to 19, with 2 abstentions, in Brussels on Wednesday 20 June ahead of the COP 24 in Katowice. The basis for the joint draft was an own initiative report by German S&D MEPs Jo Leinen and Arne Lietz.
The MEPs believe that it is the EU’s responsibility to assume a leading role in global climate action and to form a strong alliance of countries ready to ramp up their climate targets in line with the Paris agreement goals, beginning with the EU itself collectively.
To be a credible and reliable partner, the EU must speak with a single and unified voice and take an active role during the 2018 Talanoa Dialogue and COP24, which will be crucial for the implementation of the Paris agreement say MEPs.
To this end, they signal their readiness to see the EU increase the level of ambition of its 2030 target and say that a long-term net-zero carbon strategy for 2050 needs to be prepared by the end 2018.
They say the European Commission should make ratification and implementation of the Paris Agreement a condition for the conclusion of future trade agreements.
The report states that climate change can create or exacerbate instabilities, conflicts and inequalities and force people into migrating. MEPs, therefore, want EU foreign policy to be able to monitor climate change-related risks and climate policy to be mainstreamed in EU conflict-prevention policies.
They also call for a universal definition of “climate refugees” within the UN, with a view to establishing a common approach for their protection. The draft resolution will be put to a vote in Parliament during the 2-5 July plenary session in Strasbourg. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)