Both ENDS organised a Political Cafe in The Hague on Friday, 20 November in anticipation of the climate summit in Copenhagen. Here, Both ENDS and its Southern partners, GAMBA and NAPE took an in-depth look at the European Investment Bank's (EIB) investments. To what extent do they take the impacts of climate change into account? And, how consistent is their climate policy compared with the ambitions that the EU has for Copenhagen?
More than six months after the Dutch elections took place, a long period of debates, negotiations and incertainty has finally come to an end. The new coalition of center-rightwing parties was sworn in last Thursday the 26th of October. Having Sigrid Kaag of the liberal-democratic party D66 as the new Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation in the third Rutte government (Rutte III), we can look forward to where the opportunities lie in the new coalition’s plans to make the world fairer and more sustainable. The Coalition Agreement, which tries to build a bridge between the political centre and the centre-right, is a smart piece of work in terms of reaching compromises. In the current international climate of societies progressively growing apart, that is a striking achievement.