Environmental activists to resume roadblocks as Germany looks to miss emissions target

Passengers waited in traffic for hours while police removed people from busy roads. Photo: Eyevine/Zuma Press

Climate change activists plan to restart roadblock protests in Berlin after Olaf Scholz's expert council took apart his environmental agenda and found that Germany would fall short of its emissions targets.

< p>Activists from the Letzte Generation (Last Generation) group promised to return the blockade to the streets of the capital in mid-September.

“We want to create a drama in Berlin that no one can ignore,” one of them said. The leader of the group reportedly addressed the activists during an internal call, urging them to raise the level of protest «like never before.»

Throughout the spring, residents of the capital got wearily accustomed to hours of waiting. how the police dismantled the activists glued to the asphalt on the main streets.

But the May police raids against the Letzte Generation leadership, accompanied by the blocking of their bank accounts by the prosecutor's office, seem to have put an end to the activists' antics.

The «last generation» stopped after their bank accounts were frozen. Photo: Zuma/Shutterstock/Sachelle Babbar

The plan for a new round of protests comes after a commission appointed by Mr. Scholz, the German Chancellor, to evaluate his government's climate policy came to a damning conclusion.

A 28-page study released on Wednesday says Berlin has not only missed its target of cutting carbon emissions by 65 percent by 2030, but is «overestimating» the effectiveness of its own measures.

The Commission , made up of economists and energy experts, said «immediate action» is needed if the government is to close a deficit of «over 200 million tons» of greenhouse gases.

Letzte Generation spokeswoman Carla Rosch called the report «a slap in the face against the climate assassination of Chancellor Olaf Scholz» and promised «peaceful resistance to the irreversible destruction of the foundations of our lives.» » /> Protesters highlight Berlin's failure to cut emissions by 65 percent by 2030. Photo: Sachelle Babbar/Shutterstock/Zuma

Famed Friday's for Future leader Louise Neubauer called the report «a testament to poverty» for the government and added that «pressure from all sides is needed now.»

Meanwhile, forty NGOs and organizations including the Automobile Club of Germany , signed a joint letter demanding Scholz impose speed limits on the autobahns and cut subsidies in the aviation industry.

Mr Scholz is said to fear that clumsy climate policy could ignite yellow vests. protest movement among the country's rural population against high energy prices.

Attempts by junior coalition partner, the Greens, to impose a ban on gas heating in the spring have already led the far-right Alternative for Germany to double its according to polls, they are ahead of Mr. Scholz's Social Democrats.

In June, Berlin agreed to change a law meaning that emissions targets no longer have to be met in certain sectors, such as transport and industry.

Critics have accused Scholz of softening the law to ease requirements for phasing out internal combustion engines on the country's busy roads.