9 June 2025 – The EU Green Deal, which includes the much-criticised Carbon Border Tax CBAM, is once again at the centre of a scandal: as German media have revealed, the EU Commission has paid NGOs to deliberately manipulate public opinion in favour of the Commission and the Green Deal and to deliberately flood European companies with lawsuits. Nickel ore mining stopped in Raja Ampat: Indonesian nickel ore prices rise.
Indonesian nickel ore prices jump up
Last Friday, prices for Indonesian nickel ore rose significantly. Ore with a nickel content of 1.2 to 1.3% rose by between 5 and 9%. Philippine nickel ore also rose by up to 5% today, Monday.
The price increase is likely to be linked, among other things, to ongoing controversy surrounding Indonesian nickel ore mining in the Raja Ampat region. The mining licence for a large nickel mine in this important tourist region was recently suspended after it became known that ore mining there could violate current laws.
EU Green Deal manipulated: How deep is the swamp really?
Suspicions that something was fishy with the EU Green Deal had already been raised on several occasions. Hastily introduced, incomplete, intrusive in many areas, overly bureaucratic and economically unfeasible, these concerns were soon compounded by the first scandals to become public knowledge. We have also reported on this several times.
- Part 1: EU Green Deal manipulated: How deep is the swamp really?
- Part 2: Think tank of the EU steel lobby: It’s not just green NGOs that exert influence
- Part 3: Parts of the EU CBAM Expert Group are EU-funded NGOs
Commission deliberately used NGOs to manipulate Green Deal
After the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf revealed in January 2025 that the commission headed by former commissioner Frans Timmermans had paid non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to influence public opinion in favour of the EU Green Deal, or manipulate public opinion in favour of the EU Green Deal, the German newspaper Die Welt has now also reported on the secret agreements between the European Commission and NGOs. Back in 2017, an EU politician from the CDU criticised the practice of exploiting NGOs for political influence and subsequently faced massive attacks from green activists.
These were not small sums or rough guidelines, but at least 15 million euros and specific requirements such as how many social media posts per month had to be published or how many commission members and EU parliamentarians the respective organisation had to speak to. The contracts, which journalists were able to view on specially secured EU computers, were worth between 350,000 and 700,000 euros.
Requirements to intimidate companies with legal proceedings
Particularly scandalous: among them are contracts that were intended to overwhelm European companies that did not conform to the Commission’s green utopias with legal proceedings, thereby forcing them to rethink their positions. Of particular interest to the Commission were the operators of German coal-fired power plants. In general, the Commission seems to have made frequent and enthusiastic use of this manipulative method when dealing with unwelcome opponents in trade agreements, legislative proposals or even the controversial pesticide glyphosate.
Renewed scandal surrounding Commission President Ursula von der Leyen
Ursula von der Leyen, Commission President in her second term and recently awarded the prestigious Charlemagne Prize, and her Commission seem to be continuing to pursue their agenda of silence and waiting it out in this latest case of influencing public opinion. Transparency and democracy certainly look different. And they raise the legitimate question: to what extent were the EU Green Deal and the Carbon Border Tax CBAM actually established in accordance with the principles of the rule of law? We will explore this question in more depth in the coming days. The information available to us so far raises some serious questions, to say the least!
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