Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – European Commission Executive Vice President for Green Policy and Climate, Frans Timmermans, said Europe was in danger of conflict and strife during the winter. This is triggered by the skyrocketing energy prices today.
Timmermans said the threat of winter unrest, engendered by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine, should take precedence over the climate crisis.
According to him, Europe should return to fossil fuels in the short term to prevent the threat of civil unrest.
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“If our society experiences very, very strong conflicts and strife, because there is no energy, we will certainly not achieve our goals [iklim] us,” Timmermans said, launching The GuardianFriday (8/7/2022).
“We certainly won’t achieve what we need if energy shortages cause a strong disruption in our society, and we need to make sure people don’t get cold in the coming winter. We need to make sure that our industry, as much as possible, works because of one thing.” the thing that can help Putin is the divisions in our society,” he added.
Timmermans also said people suffering from cold in winter because they couldn’t afford heating would also be a disaster to solve the climate crisis.
“I have been in politics long enough, more than 30 years, to understand that people are most concerned about immediate crises and not about long-term crises. And if we don’t tackle the crisis head-on, we will definitely get off the track of a long-term crisis,” he said.
Timmermans said his aim was to assure the EU public, by November 1 at the latest, that they would not face a crisis this winter.
“I honestly believe that if we can’t give that guarantee, then people will be nervous, like everywhere because of high energy prices, inflation, food prices going up fast, because of the uncertainty this war has caused,” he said.
“Putin is using all means at his disposal to create discord in our society, so we must brace ourselves for a very difficult period,” he added, stressing that coal must be used as soon as possible.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine, energy prices have soared around the world. Before Putin attacked Ukraine, the EU’s largest economy Germany relied on Russia for most of its gas. Overall, Europe depends on Russia for about 40% of its gas.
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(tfa/luc)
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