European Union

China's military drills around Taiwan entered their second day on Tuesday, the sixth major manoeuvres Beijing has held near the self-ruled island in recent years

Netanyahu announced that Israel was awarding the US leader its highest civilian honor – the first time it has gone to a non-Israeli citizen

Written by Clare Ferguson with Sara Raja.

Extreme heat, flooding and drought are no longer distant warnings of climate change. They are becoming part of everyday life. Across Europe, measures to cut emissions, from electric vehicles to renewable energy, are already visible on our streets and in our homes. Many of these initiatives are driven and funded by the European Union, but they represent only part of a much broader effort. The European Parliament is helping shape EU climate action for the benefit of citizens, the economy and the environment.

Parliament is focused on ensuring that EU climate objectives are translated into effective action. A central element of this work has been Parliament’s role in negotiations to amend the European Climate Law to include a binding intermediate greenhouse gas emissions reduction target for 2040. By shaping this amendment, Parliament has sought to strengthen the legal pathway between the 2030 target and climate neutrality by 2050, while ensuring that the target remains grounded in scientific evidence and accompanied by clear monitoring and review mechanisms.

Parliament has also called for the energy union to be aligned with developments in EU climate and energy policy, underlining the need to boost energy infrastructure, particularly cross-border interconnections.

Since 2022, Russia’s war on Ukraine has had a massive impact on the EU energy landscape. Parliament approved the REPowerEU plan, seeking to improve EU energy security, end the EU’s dependence on Russian fossil fuels and make further advances in tackling the climate emergency. This initiative raised key ‘fit for 55’ targets set in the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) and the Renewable Energy Directive (RED).

The ‘fit for 55‘ package is a set of laws aligning existing climate rules with the European Climate Law objectives. In its role as co-legislator, Parliament has played an important role in shaping these laws. It supported vulnerable citizens and companies through the Social Climate Fund while approving an update to the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) reducing the amount of emission allowances. Parliament has also played a role in strengthening and simplifying the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) Regulation and addressing CO2 emission standards for cars and vans. Mindful of the need to provide alternatives to traditional transport fuels, Members successfully pushed for an earlier roll-out of electric charging and hydrogen refuelling infrastructure on EU roads. Parliament also negotiated more ambitious targets on renewables, carbon sinks and deforestation and land use.

The European Green Deal, approved by Parliament in 2020, seeks to tackle the challenges of climate change and environmental degradation by cutting emissions and achieving climate neutrality by 2050.

Only a year after the approval of the Green Deal, it became clear that the existing policy framework was not sufficient to reach its goals. As co-legislator, Parliament therefore contributed to raising the 2030 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction target from 40 % to a net 55 % compared with 1990 levels. Although this increase was not as high as Parliament wanted, Parliament succeeded in including the ambition of delivering negative emissions after 2050 and establishing an independent, inter-disciplinary scientific advisory panel. The Parliament and Council reached an agreement on the European Climate Law at the end of June 2021.

These actions illustrate how the European Parliament continues to shape and strengthen EU climate legislation, moving from setting targets to ensuring their effective implementation for the benefit of citizens, the economy and the environment.

Further reading:

• Amending the European Climate Law: Setting an emissions reduction target for 2040
• Future of the energy union
• EU energy infrastructure: Boosting energy security
• Revised Energy Efficiency Directive
• Renewable Energy Directive
• Fit for 55 package
• Review of the EU ETS: ‘Fit for 55’ package
• Social climate fund: ‘Fit for 55’ package
• Simplifying and strengthening CBAM
• CO2 emission standards for new cars and vans: ‘Fit for 55’ package
• Revision of the LULUCF Regulation: Strengthening the role of the land use, land-use change and forestry sector in climate action
• The European Parliament declares climate emergency
• European climate law

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L'utilisation de pétards et autres artifices qui détonnent en période de fête de fin d'année est interdite. Le porte-parole de la Police républicaine, Eric Yérima évoquant la situation sécuritaire actuelle dans le pays, l'a rappelé lors d'un entretien sur Bip radio.

Les pétards en période de fête sont interdits. Cette interdiction selon la porte-parole de la Police républicaine n'est pas motivée par les évènements du 7 décembre dernier. Selon Eric Yérima, elle s'appuie sur les dispositions du décret 2022-301 du 25 mai 2022 portant réglementation du bruit en République du Bénin.
Selon le porte-parole de la Police républicaine, la situation sécuritaire dans le pays n'est pas favorable à l'utilisation de pétards. « Vu la situation sécuritaire actuelle, il est souhaitable que les citoyens évitent d'utiliser les pétards qui pourraient créer la confusion, le stress, et déboussoler les citoyens », a-t-il laissé entendre exhortant les citoyens doivent savoir raison garder et fêter dans la sérénité. « Fêter ne donne pas le droit à des excès tels que perturber la quiétude du voisinage avec l'utilisation de pétards, ou encore, faire monter le bruit avec des appareils de sonorisation au-delà du nombre de décibels prévus par la loi », a déconseillé le commissaire de Police.
Dans le cadre de la lutte contre les nuisances sonores en période de fête, la Brigade de Protection du Littoral et de la Plage (BPLP) a procédé à la saisie d'une importante quantité de pétards le 18 décembre dernier.

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The rainwater harvesting cistern is everywhere in Brazil's semi-arid region, a social technology that reduced water scarcity for its inhabitants. Elizabete Sousa Soares wanted to leave Jatobá when her daughter Maria was born 11 years ago, but decided to stay in her small rural town thanks to the cistern and other social technologies that have improved her life. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

By Mario Osava
USERRA DAS ALMAS, Brazil, Dec 29 2025 (IPS)

“The work of collecting seeds saved me from depression,” caused by her daughter’s suicide at the age of 29, said Maria do Desterro Soares, 64, who lives in the poor rural community of Jatobá in northeastern Brazil.

She drew her younger sister, Maria de Jesus Soares, 45, who lost her husband in a car accident and also struggles to avoid falling into depression, into the activity. The two walk together for nearly two hours to reach the forests where seeds abound.“The reserve is a great water reservoir. A study we conducted on avoided runoff showed this 6,285-hectare area can retain an astonishing 4.78 billion liters per year” - Gilson Miranda.

They only earn some 1,000 reais (US$185) in a “good year,” but “it’s my work, my pleasure, it’s what I want and I like doing it,” claimed Maria do Desterro, who also makes ice cream and medicines for flu and other illnesses with locally sourced juices, teas, peels, and honey.

She is one of the 121 people trained by the Caatinga Association (AC) through 2023 for the collection and management of seeds from native plants of this biome exclusive to Brazil, as a way to generate income and restore forests.

The association, founded in 1998 to protect the caatinga, the biome of the semi-arid region in the Brazilian northeast, manages the Serra das Almas Natural Reserve (RNSA) and disseminates social technologies for coexistence with the semi-arid ecoregion in surrounding communities.

The caatinga occupies 10% of Brazil’s vast territory and is home to 27 million people. Its vegetation is generally low, with twisted branches and trunks, appearing dead in the dry season and turning green just days after rain. It also features large trees that reach heights of tens of meters.

Maria de Jesus Soares and her older sister, Maria do Desterro Soares, extract seeds from the buriti coconut, a palm tree also known as moriche, found in several parts of Brazil, including its exclusive caatinga biome. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

Coexistence, instead of fighting against nature

To coexist, rather than fighting droughts, is a guiding principle of the actions that are improving life in Brazil’s poorest region, the Northeast, offering a climate lesson for the country and the world.

This slogan, set in motion by civil society organizations, spurred several social technologies as solutions for water scarcity. Best known is the rainwater harvesting cistern for domestic use, with over 1.2 million units built since 2003.

Cisterns, bio-water (a system that cleans household water for reuse in planting), green septic tanks (a concrete tank with soil, filters, and a banana plant base), solar ovens, and eco-efficient stoves are the five tecghnologies being disseminated.

The AC website reports that 1,481 of these “technologies” have been implemented.

The AC has the RNSA for environmental education and as a source of income through eco-tourism. It works in 40 communities nearby where some 4,000 families live, implementing social technologies and supporting the conservation of the reserve and the entire caatinga.

Headquartered in Fortaleza, the capital of the northeastern state of Ceará, and in Crateús, in the west of that same state near the RNSA, the association stands out from other non-governmental organizations by having this conservation unit of 6,285 hectares of dense forests and four streams.

The green septic tank, also called a biosepitic bed, treats wastewater from toilets with microorganisms that process the waste, leaving the water ready to irrigate crops in the semi-arid region of Northeast Brazil. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

The caatinga mitigates climate change

“The reserve is an open-air laboratory, where research on fauna, flora, carbon, and water takes place, so we can understand the importance of this area, and of the entire caatinga,” explained Gilson Miranda, a biologist and manager of the RNSA for the Caatinga Association.

In 2015 – 2022, the caatinga was responsible for nearly 40% of the carbon removed from the atmosphere in Brazil, he said, based on a study by São Paulo State University on greenhouse gas capture.

This is because the rapid regreening of the vegetation, an indicator of intense photosynthetic activity when it rains, makes the caatinga a major greenhouse gas sink, different from the Amazon, which is an immense carbon reservoir.

“That is why preserving and conserving the caatinga is strategic in a climate adaptation scenario,” said Miranda in an interview with IPS.

This biome, exclusive to Brazil, covers an area of 844,453 square kilometers.

Water is another wealth of Serra das Almas, which was designated a Private Natural Heritage Reserve (RPPN) in the year 2000.

“The reserve is a great water reservoir. A study we conducted on avoided runoff showed this 6,285-hectare area can retain an astonishing 4.78 billion liters per year,” said Miranda.

Around the springs, there are very tall, green trees that differ from the usual biome. The gameleira (Ficus gomelleira), can reach up to 40 or 50 meters, according to Jair Martins, the tourist guide on hikes along the six trails of Serra das Almas.

This water, retained in the soil by the forests, actually drains slowly. The four springs preserved in the reserve do not dry up, but are unable to sustain year-round the streams that feed the Poti River, whose course passes to the east and north of Serra das Almas.

Nor is this moisture enough to keep the caatinga vegetation green, which is very dry in December, with the green of some shrubs or trees more resistant to water stress.

Maria Clemente da Silva was only able to cultivate her garden when she gained access to bio-water, because the public water supply is limited to three hours a day in Jatobá, a poor community in the Brazilian caatinga. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

Mitigated drought

In the surroundings of the RNSA, the drought is harsher.

Maria Clemente da Silva, 59, relies on bio-water to supplement the water she uses to irrigate her small garden. The public water supply only operates for two to three hours per day, which is not enough for cultivating vegetables, such as lettuce and onions, or fruit trees like papaya, banana, acerola, orange, and cashew.

About 100 meters behind her house, a forest of tall, very green trees reveals that, with water, the caatinga vegetation gains exuberance. It is the moisture that remained in a low-lying area of a river that practically dried up due to deforestation and fires set to “clear” the land, explained Elisabete de Souza Soares.

Water is the most keenly felt shortage, according to Souza and other women who spoke to IPS and a group of journalism students visiting the Jatobá community, in the municipality of Buriti dos Montes, in the state of Piauí, where the AC’s socio-environmental actions benefit the population and the protection of the RNSA.

All of them received cisterns, the small three-burner ecological stove, and other “technologies” that reduced difficulties in their lives. “Before the cistern, we would fetch water from a public fountain about a kilometer away, carrying cans on our heads,” recalled Souza.

When she was pregnant with her daughter Maria, 11 years ago, she thought about moving away from the community where she had always lived in search of water. “Now I won’t leave here, where I was born,” she said.

The dry vegetation in December, the peak of the annual dry season, displays some resistant shrubs and trees that maintain green patches in the caatinga forests of Brazil’s Northeast region. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

The Caatinga Association adopted a comprehensive conservation model with broad participation from the local population, including in the economic benefits of work within the RNSA, such as guiding ecotourists and providing other services.

The AC’s approach is always socio-environmental, a main component in protecting the reserve and the caatinga in general, stated Miranda.

Inside the reserve, there is a modest hotel that can accommodate up to 36 people. Local tourism tends to expand due to promotion by the governments of the states of Ceará and Piauí, which share the Serra das Almas Natural Reserve.

The nearby Poti River flows through a 140-kilometer-long canyon and has become a major tourist attraction.

The reserve is a legacy of the US Johnson family, owners of the SC Johnson company, which, because it uses vegetable wax for its furniture cleaning and conservation products, imported carnauba wax, a palm abundant in Ceará, Piauí, and Rio Grande do Norte, another Northeastern state.

In 1998, the leader of the family’s fourth generation, Samuel Johnson, repeated an expedition to Ceará that his father had made in 1935 and decided to establish a Caatinga Conservation Fund, using part of his fortune. This led to the RNSA and the Caatinga Association, composed of environmental specialists in the biome.

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En un mois, 106 cybercriminels ont été arrêtés au Bénin et 4318 comptes ont été fermés. C'est dans le cadre de l'opération Sentinelle, menée conjointement avec Interpol.

La lutte contre la cybercriminalité s'intensifie à l'échelle continentale. Une opération cordonnée dans 19 pays a permis d'arrêter 574 cybercriminels et de récupérer 3 millions de dollars. Selon le Centre national d'investigation numériques, l'opération a ciblé des schémas de compromission des e-mails professionnels et l'extorsion numérique.

La même source informe qu'au Bénin, du 27 octobre au 27 novembre, 106 cybercriminels ont été arrêtés et 4318 comptes, liés à des arnaques sur les réseaux sociaux, ont été fermés.

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Le Ministre du Cadre de vie et des Transports, chargé du Développement Durable rappelle à l'ensemble des partis politiques et candidats engagés dans les campagnes électorales que le décret n°2023-453 du 13 septembre 2023 portant réglementation de l'affichage publicitaire est en vigueur. Dans un communiqué, le ministre du Cadre de Vie et des Transports, rappelle les règles à respecter.

Les partis politiques, candidats, responsables de campagnes électorales et sympathisants sont appelés à préserver la salubrité publique, la sécurité des citoyens, l'esthétique du cadre de vie ainsi que l'équité entre tous les candidats et partis politiques durant la période électorale. Il est expressément rappelé que :

1. l'affichage publicitaire est interdit sur les arbres, les feux tricolores, les panneaux de signalisation, les édifices publics, les clôtures et les équipements urbains non prévus à cet effet.

2. seuls les emplacements dédiés et autorisés par les communes peuvent être utilisés pour l'affichage électoral.

3. tout affichage sauvage ou non conforme sera immédiatement retiré aux frais du parti ou du candidat concerné, et pourra donner lieu à des sanctions administratives et financières.

4. les espaces publics, places, ronds-points et voies principales doivent rester libres de toute obstruction visuelle ou physique.

Tous les partis politiques, candidats et responsables de campagne sont appelés à faire preuve de civisme et à respecter scrupuleusement cette réglementation, afin de garantir des élections apaisées, transparentes et respectueuses de notre environnement commun.

Le ministre du Cadre de Vie informe que la surveillance du respect de ces règles sera renforcée sur le terrain par les services municipaux et préfectoraux.

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Existing beneficiaries will be eligible for higher payouts

The sharp rebuke comes amid investigations into corruption and sexual harassment involving officials close to the prime minister