Germany made ‘painful choices’ in clearing village to make way for coal mine, climate envoy says
Germany had to make “painful choices” when it evicted people from a village to make way for the expansion of a coal mine, its climate envoy has told Sky News.
Footage of German riot police in Lutzerath clashing with protesters against the nearby Garzweiler coal mine made headlines worldwide.
It was a decision some found incongruous with Germany’s ambition to be a global climate leader.
Jennifer Morgan, state secretary and special envoy for international climate action, said: “These are the very challenging societal debates that one has to have if you’re serious about moving forward on the climate crisis.
“Are there tough choices and painful choices that come along the way? Absolutely.”
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14 January: Protests to save German village
Ms Morgan pointed to the other ways Germany had scrambled to ensure the lights stayed on as Russian President Vladimir Putin squeezed Europe’s gas supplies.
This included phasing out all Russian fossil fuels imports “in a very short period of time,” shifting to 80% renewables by 2030 and helping cut energy use by 60% in industry and 14% by households, she said.
Ms Morgan added: “I would hope that one sees that as the direction that Germany is moving in, that there are very difficult political compromises that get made,” she said, referencing the fact the coal-intensive North Rhine-Westphalia region had also brought forward its coal end date.
But she admitted Germany was “vulnerable” to the recent energy security crisis and that it had “learned the hard way that one shouldn’t be so dependent on fossil fuels or on one country”.
The campaigner-turned-diplomat, who was once head of Greenpeace International, also hinted at some sympathy with the Lutzerath activists.
She called it “incredibly important in a climate crisis” that young people can engage “in an act of political debate about their future”.
Police officers spray activists during a protest against the expansion of a mine
‘Rebalance fossil fuel interests’
In an interview in the German ambassador’s residence in London, Ms Morgan said “there needs to be a rebalancing” of fossil fuel influence at the annual United Nations COP climate summits.
Last week, 450 green groups wrote to the UN to request a crackdown, after 630 lobbyists registered to attend COP27 in Egypt last year.
Their concerns were amplified after United Arab Emirates, one of the world’s largest oil producers and host of COP28 this December, appointed an oil executive and government to run the talks.
Ms Morgan said the world must “respect who the country has put forward” and that Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, like any COP president, would have to “take on a role that is actually above what they currently do in their day jobs”.
Campaigners have called for Mr Al Jaber to resign from his role as head of the state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Corporation, but Ms Morgan declined to say whether she would raise this with him when she meets him in February.
Asked if Germany, a long time sceptic of nuclear power, should reconsider the clean energy form, she said: “Definitely not”.
“Nuclear has massive risks on its own, it’s extremely expensive and it takes a long time to build,” she added.
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Tom Heap and Victoria Seabrook discuss fossil fuel lobbyists at COP climate summits
Ms Morgan, who was in London for talks with government ministers Lord Zac Goldsmith and Graham Stewart, said it would be “safer” for the UK – which is planning vast nuclear power expansion – to steer clear.
“Going further in offshore wind, as the UK has been doing, and building it out domestically, also on land, going for energy efficiency – I think that’s a safer way to go,” she said.
Ms Morgan, who represents one of the world’s largest emitters and economies, also spoke about what keeps her awake at night.
“That we’re moving too slowly,” she said. “That the pace and scale of change isn’t fast enough, and that we have to do so many things at once.
“How do we get everyone to act as if it is the crisis that it is?”
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The bodies of three Israeli hostage taken by Hamas have been recovered in Gaza.
The remains were discovered in an overnight operation carried out by Israel’s military and intelligence agency Shin Bet, said chief military spokesman Daniel Hagari.
Itzhak Gelerenter, 56, Amit Buskila, 28, and Shani Louk, 22, were killed at the Nova music festival on 7 October, with their bodies then taken into Gaza by Hamas militants.
Ms Louk’s body was seen face-down in a pick-up truck travelling through Gaza in a video that was shared widely on social media after the hostages were taken.
Israel-Gaza war latest updates
Shani Louk
Itzhak Gelerenter
Amit Buskila
“They were celebrating life in the Nova music festival and they were murdered by Hamas,” said Mr Hagari.
He said their families have been notified.
“Our hearts go out to them, to the families at this difficult time. We will leave no stone unturned, we will do everything in our power to find our hostages and bring them home.”
The military did not give immediate details on where their bodies were found.
Ms Louk’s father has said the return of his daughter’s body to her family has been a form of closure.
Nissim Louk told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz his daughter “radiated light, to her and those who surrounded her, and in her death she still does”.
He added: “She is a symbol of the people of Israel, between light and darkness. Her inner and outer beauty that shone for all the world to see is a special one.”
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‘No respect’ for the world after Gaza horrors
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In November, the brother of Ms Louk told Sky News of their last phone call as his sister tried to escape Hamas.
Speaking about the video that was circulated online after she was taken, Amit Louk said: “I never thought I was going to be in contact with this type of video, seeing my sister in that brutal position.
“And just in that moment, the whole family just crashed.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the deaths “heartbreaking”, saying: “We will return all of our hostages, both the living and the dead.”
Meanwhile, Professor Hagai Levine, a member of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, has said the recovery of the bodies is a “painful reminder” of those who are still in captivity.
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Child with rare genetic disorder stuck in Gaza
“We do not lose hope. We are preparing for the return of the hostages that are alive,” he added.
Israel has been operating in the Gaza Strip’s southern city of Rafah, where it says it has intelligence that hostages are being held.
Hamas-led militants killed around 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and abducted around 250 others in the 7 October attack.
Around half of those have since been freed, most in swaps for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel during a ceasefire in November.
Israel says around 100 hostages are still captive in Gaza, along with the bodies of around 30 more.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza since the attack has killed more than 35,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials.
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Gaza situation ‘a complete disaster’
Mr Netanyahu has vowed to both eliminate Hamas and bring all the hostages back.
He faces pressure to resign, and the US has threatened to scale back its support over the humanitarian situation in Gaza.
Israelis are divided into two main camps: those who want the government to put the war on hold and free the hostages, and others who think the hostages are an unfortunate price to pay for eradicating Hamas.
World
Slovakia PM shooting: Friend of suspect recalls laughing with him just days before assassination attempt
Mile L’Udovit is leaning on the front door of his apartment block when we meet, just as he has done so often since moving in four decades ago.
He was one of the original tenants of the tatty building and so was his dear friend Juraj Cintula – the man charged with trying to kill Slovakia’s prime minister.
Mile is at once shocked, bemused, appalled and bewildered.
“He’s a good friend,” he tells me. Both men are 71 years old and talked often. “He was a decent, polite man. A good worker. His wife is a professor and his kids were okay. He had a good reputation. Everything was okay.
“Nobody expected something like this to happen. No one could imagine it. That’s the worst thing about it.
“I spoke to him on Monday and we were having a laugh, like neighbours do. It’s so unpleasant.”
Suspect Juraj Cintula is the author of several poetry collections. Pic: ENEX
The apartment block where L’Udovit and Cintula have lived for decades. Pic: AP Photo/Denes Erdos
He shakes his head and gestures up to Cintula’s apartment on the top of the building. “He will either die or get a life sentence. It’s going to be so hard for his family.”
Cintula has not yet been officially identified as the suspect, but it’s common knowledge in Slovakia.
Read more:
PM Fico’s background, beliefs and politics
What we know about the shooting suspect
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Video shows moment Slovak PM was shot
Armed police even brought him back to the apartment, dressed in a bulletproof jacket and helmet, to help gather evidence. So why, I ask Mile, did his old friend allegedly try to kill Robert Fico?
“You know, I can’t really say,” he replies thoughtfully. “We took politics as something to laugh at. But we kept our own opinions – he had his, I had mine.
“He was opposed to certain acts of the government and his opinions were quite different. But what was in his mind? Really, nobody knows.”
World
Slovakia’s PM Robert Fico has second surgery in two days after assassination attempt leaves him in ‘very serious’ condition
Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico has had a second surgery in two days after being shot multiple times in Europe’s first assassination attempt in more than 20 years.
The 59-year-old was shot multiple times while greeting supporters in the former mining town of Handlova on Wednesday. A man has been arrested over the shooting.
Mr Fico was left with life-threatening injuries, and while his condition improved the president-elect of Slovakia said he escaped death “by just a hair”.
Read more:
Who is Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico?
He is currently recovering at the University FD Roosevelt Hospital in Banska Bystrica, and underwent a second surgery to remove dead tissue inside of his body.
Hospital director Miriam Lapunikova said he underwent a CT scan and is currently awake and stable in an intensive care unit, but added his condition is still “very serious”.
Miriam Lapunikova said Robert Fico underwent a second surgery to remove dead tissue on Friday. Pic: AP
Deputy prime minister Robert Kaliniak also told reporters: “I think it will take several more days until we will definitely know the direction of the further development.”
While Mr Fico continued to recover from the attack – the first assassination attempt of a European political leader for more than 20 years – police brought the suspect to his home while they searched it.
Markiza, a Slovakian television station, showed footage of the suspect accompanied by police in the town of Levice and reported police had seized a computer and some documents.
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Slovak PM shooting suspect’s home raided
He was then escorted out and back into the police car.
The suspect was previously named as 71-year-old Juraj Cintula. He is said to be a writer and poet.
President-elect Peter Pellegrini said on Thursday that the prime minister is living “the worst hours and days of his life” after the shooting.
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If the “gunshot wounds were just a few millimetres either side, we would be talking about him as the late prime minister”, he said.
Mr Fico has long been a divisive figure. His return to power last year on a pro-Russian, anti-American ticket led to worries among fellow EU and NATO members that he would turn his country further away from the Western mainstream.
Under his stewardship, the government has halted arms deliveries to Ukraine, and his opponents worry he will lead Slovakia in the footsteps of Viktor Orban’s Hungary.
Thousands have repeatedly rallied in the capital and across Slovakia to protest against Mr Fico’s policies.
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