Vídeo: “Guerra”, afirma Virginijus Sinkevičius, comissário lituano cessante da UE

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[Music] in light of the devastating floods in Spain which killed over 200 people and ruined many people’s livelihoods for the Europe conversation I catch up with former EU commissioner for the environment and the ocean virginius sinicus who’s now also the green party me for Lithuania he says he’s worried about the eu’s ability to combat global warming with the European parliament’s shift to the right and far right of the political Spectrum virginius covici thanks very much for joining us on the Europe conversation um I’m going to start off because you just finished your five years as EU commissioner for the environment oceans and Fisheries can you tell us can you reflect on that a little bit um how did you find for example Ursa veline as president of the European commission thank you very much for for having me well I think she showed a tremendous leadership especially in crisis situation uh she’s been reactive uh Ukraine uh but also Co um she was always there on the ground uh very much involved uh looking for solution trying to get decisions uh decisions through I would say that was very difficult 5 years but in many of those cases uh commission under the leadership of of USA on line found uh solutions for example you know going out of Co all member states together I think that was huge European moment but the principle for the union that was amazing doesn’t matter your GDP is uh as size as Cyprus or as size of France or Germany everyone got vaccines together and everyone uh got out of Co together so I hope that the next 5 years will be also about the commitments that were taken um that with which we went ahead with because you need to give Clarity also to businesses to stakeholders to Partners abroad so therefore even so that the house uh of course it’s much more right-wing leaning but actually if you compare the Coalition 5 years ago and and and Coalition now is the same it’s EP snd and renew three-party Coalition which in many cases uh can be supported uh by greens uh can be supported of course uh by the other groups but I think that gives also a a Clarity that decisions that were taken they need to be implemented but one of the issues that Ursa vine championed when she first arrived in 2019 was of course the green deal and you were the only uh EU commissioner from the greens and also you’re the only uh green MEP for Lithuania um but we’ve seen her and the EP party which led the green deal roll back quite significantly on the issue of deforestation and also the nature restoration deal so does that make you feel that things aren’t as secure when URS Le on line meets these particular moments well I don’t want to pin it on on on on one person uh you know I think commission is a much broader body which also heavily influenced also by the member states I think what’s extremely important is uh that when we arrive to a decision in at the EU level and it’s way different I was a minister also in in Lithuania before arriving to commission it’s way different from a national level it’s much more difficult because you have 27 member states with different interests different cultural backgrounds different understanding of priorities um and then you also have the parliament which sometimes very split on some issues sometimes very United so to arrive to that decision it takes you two three years it’s never straightforward uh so therefore I think it’s extremely important to respect those decisions because they were reached under the compromise but the EP which was interesting ahead of the European Parliament elections essentially you know denigrated the green deer and they sort of cast it off as the idea from the greens and the greens had actually nothing to do with it that that’s I always look back and I think it’s so funny that greens had to pay the bill when they were not even part of of of the Coalition yes the the the elections did not go to well for the greens uh they were accused of of of the green deal while it was because you know commission had the largest number of Commissioners were from EP if you look at the government’s uh the number the largest number of governments is EP and the biggest group in in in the house was EP but somehow they managed to turn it around and and pretend that now they sort of because even you know the biggest protest were farmers so if you actually even look back what why they protested the main thing was cap the new cap uh and they implementation of GX which is this environmental pillar of of the cap which was always there but the proposal came actually from the EP commissioner at that time my colleague Phil Hogan was responsible for agriculture and it was his proposal which was finalized then by yanovski who is even ECA so but on on a very serious note though um the fight against global warming is potentially interrupted by the makeup of the European Parliament which is as you mentioned earlier moved to the far right to MEPS that are uh not as committed let’s say to H global warming the fight against that I mean we look at Valencia in Spain in the last couple of weeks well in excess of 200 people dead complete Carnage some of the worst Reign this century and it looks if you have a group of parliamentarians that are skeptical around that how does the EU then lead or at least tackle climate change that’s correct and unfortunately we talk about it only when such huge disasters happen and um I think we we all saw this Devastation in Valencia but um you know just a couple years ago we could witness it here in in in Belgium uh Germany uh where again those floods have taken uh many many lives because you know those disasters they have happened before it’s it’s not only because of of of the climate change but one of the key pillars is uh preparedness because we see that the scale and the intensity is is is larger and larger and such disasters happens more and more often so one of the key for example things when when you talk about floods is the condition of the soil so if soil is degraded that means that the scale of disaster is going to be even greater second think of course when you talk about the the reaction afterwards about the warning system that that’s important uh but that’s not key if we don’t have ecosystems in a good health um unfortunately you know then we are only talking um afterwards uh how to mediate uh the disaster uh how to help people and of course the the reaction always have to be immediate uh but we need to ensure that we can uh deal with it in a way that you know uh people’s life wouldn’t be in danger and in some areas in the EU you can see that for example with forest fires actually uh the preparedness work has uh given uh very good results um just moving on to Lithuania because the situation Ukraine is is pretty dire and we’re coming into again winter where Russia is targeting energy sources again demoralizing the citizens there and of course the Army um are you confident over the next five years the EU and Europe and the West has got what it takes given how president zelinsky’s Victory plan has sort of um that the response has not been very strong to that I’m not comfortable about upcoming winter not even talking about five years um the upcoming winter will be the most difficult one I think uh you know uh already you know rebuilding the heating energy um electricity infrastructure was very difficult uh task and Russia continued to do so it’s an open terrorism against innocent people because you know it’s not military infrastructure that is without water without heating without electricity no it’s it’s it’s people uh it’s hospitals it’s schools uh it’s uh people’s houses and uh of course they continue to do so uh this winter as well uh we see that the the capacities are uh limited um and the worst that of course uh uh there is a a a a a war fatigue I mean I cannot blame ukrainians for for for war fatigue you know they’ve lost so many loved ones and and and and and and close ones family members uh and they really defending fiercely but uh you know us uh Europe I do not understand you know why there is war fatig we are not at War we are not doing enough and I hear more and more people leaders speaking about the war fatigue and because I mean we hear president zinski hugely critical of the fact that he can’t preemptively strike against 10,000 North Korean troops readying to fight his own Army um because of the restrictions this is this is a unique thing that that Russia managed actually to achieve in this war and I think it will it will go into history books that they separated their own Society from the war very much so you know they used prisoners they used uh uh um basically conscripts and and and and so on but taking them from you know far away regions not touching on on on bigger cities Moscow and St Petersburg and now when they see that they really lack troops they went and tapped into North Korea and we don’t know what numbers are there while you know West uh they seem like they are out of ideas uh helping Ukraine and not only out of ideas but actually limiting Ukraine of uh having you know basically uh being uh being fully operational and with this limitation still Ukraine managed to achieve a lot because of course coming from Lithuania you have in living memory um the experience of brutal Russian occupation do you think there’s an appreciation around that in Europe because you were talking about war fatigue and like you in Lithuania you’re saying well hold on a minute we actually can’t afford to have work fatigue what what do you think the consequences for the countries like Lithuania and Europe would be if Ukraine does lose so we we we we don’t know where Russia stops you know they they said they will never attack Ukraine they have you know breaken many rules before and you don’t know where the appetite ends uh with now the military capabilities that they have built with the number of troops that they have uh you just don’t know you know depending on the ending of uh of of this War uh what they going to do next uh and maybe Putin will be tempted to challenge NATO uh you know very often NATO by trying you know in history shows that you know by trying to avoid war you end up in war but you end up in situation where you completely unprepared so at least we have to be ready so that he and his his his uh his uh troops uh generals uh military would not be tempted to test our defense capabilities okay vginus scious thank you very much for joining us on the Europe conversation my pleasure