EU passes landmark nature restoration law despite Austrian dispute

European Union member countries gave final approval to a key biodiversity measure, a bloc-wide nature restoration law after Austria's climate minister defied her chancellor to back it.

EU environment ministers on Monday approved a milestone bill aimed at restoring degraded ecosystems in the 27-nation bloc.

The support of Austria's Climate Minister Leonore Gewessler, a Greens member, helped the EU's Nature Restoration Law obtain the majority needed to pass but angered her country's governing conservatives, the People's Party (OeVP).

The about-face by the minister gave the law the majority backing it needed to be adopted, confirmed Belgium, which holds the rotating EU presidency. Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer declared her decision "unlawful".

"No one is above the law," the chancellor's office said in a statement, adding that it would file a separate criminal complaint against Gewessler in Austria claiming "abuse of office".

"There is a suspicion that Leonore Gewessler... is acting unlawfully and knowingly... against the constitution — this constitutes abuse of office," OeVP Secretary General Christian Stocker said in a statement.

Gewessler said her "courageous" decision to support the bill was legal, adding in a statement that "Today's decision is a victory for nature".

Ahead of the vote, Alain Maron, the environment minister for the Brussels region who chaired the EU ministerial meeting, dismissed the row as an "internal controversy in Austria".

'That's the way it works'

"The vote is given by the ministers around the table and in the room. And there is no question about that. That's the way it works," he told reporters upon arriving for the meeting, which he chaired because his country holds the EU's rotating presidency.

The row between Nehammer and Gewessler is the most serious disagreement since the OeVP and the Greens entered an uneasy coalition in 2020, and comes ahead of national elections set for September.

EU lawmakers in February gave final approval to the bill, overriding conservative attempts to torpedo it.

The rules are a central part of the EU's environmental goals under its "Green Deal", a set of laws aimed at helping the bloc meet its climate goals, but some farmers say they threaten their livelihoods.

The legislation says the EU's 27 members must introduce binding targets to restore at least 20 percent of the bloc's degraded land and marine ecosystems, in particular those with the most potential to capture and store carbon and to prevent and reduce the impact of natural disasters.