European Parliament declares climate emergency

A man rides his motorcycle past a wildfire on peatland in Ogan Ilir, South Sumatra Province, Indonesia on August 5, 2019. (EPA-EFE File Photo)
 

Strasbourg, France, November 28 (EFE): The European Parliament on Thursday declared a "climate emergency," making Europe the first continent to do so.

The declaration came days before the start of a major UN climate summit in Madrid and two weeks before the European Commission presents the first draft of its European Green Deal.

Members of the European Parliament passed a resolution demanding more ambitious action when it comes to saving the planet from climate change.

The text was backed by 429 votes in favor versus 225 against.

Nineteen MEPs abstained.

The European Parliament declared a climate emergency and called on the European Commission, European Union member states and international institutions to take concrete action before it's too late.

The declaration also urged the freshly formed Commission, which begins its mandate on 1 December after it was given the green light on Wednesday by the Parliament, to assess the environmental impact of all relevant legislative and budgetary proposals.

"With current policies, the Earth is likely to warm more than three degrees by 2100," the European Parliament said in a statement posted to its Twitter account Thursday.

The institution warned of mass extinctions and pointed out that much of the planet will become uninhabitable if action is not taken.

The body also pointed out that carbon emissions had "hit a new record level" last year and said they would need to drop 7.6 percent annually from 2020 in order to match targets.

On Wednesday, MEPs approved next year's EU budget, setting aside half a billion euros for "climate-related expenditure."

"We have succeeded in increasing the budget lines dealing with climate protection by 504 million euros and in ensuring that next year more than 21 percent of expenditure will be climate-related," said leader rapporteur Monika Hohlmeier, according to an official statement.

Next week, a UN summit on climate change is set to take place in the Spanish capital.

The meeting was originally going to take place in Santiago, Chile, but the government back out of it owing to the unrest gripping the Latin American country.