German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke on Thursday about the country’s path toward climate goals. During the annual press conference, it admitted failure on the grounds that “what was achieved was not enough”.
In addition to criticizing his country’s Germany, Merkel believes the world has largely failed. “I am equipped with enough scientific sense to see that objective conditions require our inability to continue at the same pace,” the chancellor said in his speech, adding that the world “must accelerate.”
Read more: Germany wants to help the European Union after the floods
She also made it clear that Germany should not be held responsible for insufficient climate action, but hopes that future changes can make the nation a leading country.
At the same time, she believes, the country has done a lot to prepare for the economic changes brought about by climate change. According to the Guardian, Germany increased its mix of renewable energy sources, from 10 to 40 percent, and cut carbon dioxide emissions by 20 percent between 1990-2010 and another 20 percent since then.
The climate issue has been given new life
Merkel has defended her government’s decision from 2011, which was to phase out all nuclear power in the country until 2022. Critics say the country is thus becoming more dependent on coal power. “For Germany, the dice has been rolled,” Merkel said, adding that she could not see the future government change this decision.
Read more: Germany approaches the victims of the disaster
Climate change is back on the agenda in Germany, in large part due to the disastrous floods that hit the country recently. With at least 179 casualties, a crippled infrastructure system and thousands of destroyed buildings, Merkel made it clear that reconstruction would be a difficult task, but that she would struggle until her “last day as chancellor”.
Merkel’s 16 years in power are the longest in an EU head of state. This fall, her party, the Christian Democratic Union, will hold elections to appoint her successor.
Angela Merkel
He was born in 1954 in Hamburg. The father was a priest, and the mother was a teacher of Latin and English. The family moved to East Germany when Angela Merkel, then named Kasner by his last name, was only a few weeks old.
He spent his first 35 years in the German Democratic Republic. Ph.D. in Quantum Chemistry in 1986. He began political involvement in connection with the fall of the Berlin Wall and was elected to the Bundestag for the CDU in 1990.
In 1991-1994 he was Minister for Women and Youth in the Helmut Kohl government.
In 2000, Merkel became the head of the Christian Democratic Union and since 2005 has been the German chancellor.
In October 2018, Merkel announced her resignation as president of the CDU, but at the same time said she wanted to remain as chancellor until the end of her term.
He is married to chemistry professor Joachim Sauer, whom Merkel rarely sees in public. The couple have no children.
Sources: Federal Chancellery, TT
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