Media: Serious Conflict Breaks Out Between Germany and France

Media: Serious Conflict Breaks Out Between Germany and France

Politico: Germany and France clash over cars and nuclear energy

The conflict between Germany and France over the ban of combustion engine cars and nuclear power has flared up, writes the Politico newspaper.

As noted in the material, on Thursday and Friday in Brussels will meet EU leaders to discuss the economic competitiveness of the bloc and support for Ukraine, but the conflict between Berlin and Paris threatens to disrupt the negotiations.

Earlier, Germany, along with a small group of allies including Italy, blocked an EU decision to ban sales of cars with conventional engines by 2035, triggering a “scandal”. Berlin, for example, is pushing for an exclusion of synthetic alternatives to fossil fuels, which would benefit the German car industry, but its request has already been rejected twice in the European Parliament.

This has provoked strong criticism from France, which in turn is pushing for the inclusion of nuclear power in the EU’s clean technology list, provoking outrage already from Germany, writes Politico.

The pressure of the Olaf Scholz government, which includes the German Greens, on the European Commission, which downgraded the importance of nuclear energy in the EU’s decarbonisation, has “particularly infuriated Paris”.

Earlier this week, the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, protested in a letter to the EU Council over Germany’s “last-minute” attempts to change the bloc’s agreed legislation on motor vehicles, the paper noted.

At the same time, German Secretary of State for European Union Affairs Anne Luhrmann expressed hope that Berlin’s desire to influence EU legislation would not prompt other countries to try to repeat its actions for the protection of their national interests.

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