February 11, 2019 | Read more After almost a year of struggling to get basic environmental information from the EBRD about the Krapska hydropower project, Bankwatch has submitted an official complaint [1] to the bank’s Secretary General. As we run the same administrative circles over and over again, another precious river valley has been irreversibly damaged.
February 8, 2019 | Read more “We invest in changing lives” is the slogan of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, whose investments in 2018 reached EUR 9.5 billion through 395 projects. Whether the change is for better depends on the bank’s environmental and human rights safeguards.
February 7, 2019 | Read more Brussels – In a complaint lodged today with the European Investment Bank (EIB), civil society groups protest that the bank systematically underestimated the climate footprint of a fossil fuel mega project, the Southern Gas Corridor, which helped justify providing it with major financial support using EU public money.
January 31, 2019 | Read more Brussels / Sofia – the European Commission has been accused of failing to monitor how EU funds are being spent in Bulgaria, according to a complaint [1] filed to the European Ombudsman over the Commission’s handling of a motorway project that threatens a protected Natura 2000 site.
January 22, 2019 | Read more Brussels, for immediate release – Today the European Parliament’s Committee on Regional Development (REGI) adopted the so-called Common Provisions Regulation, which sets the conditions and principles governing the funding for Cohesion Policy from 2021 to 2027. NGO groups CEE Bankwatch Network and Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe welcome the regulation, which exceeds the European Commission’s proposal by introducing new and additional safeguards against climate change.
January 16, 2019 | Read more Strasbourg, Brussels – Today the European Parliament took a disappointing stance on climate when voting to approve the establishment of InvestEU, the EU’s financing tool to attract private investments – say NGO groups CEE Bankwatch Network, Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe, WWF European Policy Office, and Counter Balance. The approved investment package keeps the door open to further public investments in fossil fuels, which is incompatible with the requirements of the Paris Climate Agreement.
January 16, 2019 | Read more The new gold mine in Krumovgrad boasts environmental performance and social responsibility, yet there are black spots along the path of the Bulgarian gold around the globe.
January 15, 2019 | Read more Macedonia made headlines in December when the United Nations ranked its capital city, Skopje, as the most polluted capital city in Europe. If the ranking included non-capitals, it would not miss Novaci – a small village in the country’s south that also gasps for breath.
January 8, 2019 | Read more If you’re looking for a revolution, sign up for notifications from your embassy. The messages pinging on smartphone screens that night in October began not long after stepping into the evening streets around the Yerevan Cascade, warning of impending demonstrations outside the Armenian parliament. To be sure, the flashing blue and red sirens and thousands of people flooding past were impossible to ignore as well, so the consulates’ SMSs came as little surprise and instead provided more than anything context to the oncoming commotion.
December 19, 2018 | Read more The planned Belgrade waste incinerator in Serbia, being considered for financing by the EBRD, EIB and IFC, is incompatible with increasing waste prevention and recycling rates and endangers the already precarious livelihoods of the 12,000 people who currently live from waste-picking in the city. The recently published environmental and social impact assessment for the project fails to resolve either of these issues, as well as numerous others.
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