Guterres warns of “climate hell”
António Guterres speaks plainly like no other top politician.
In a speech never before delivered by a world leader, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on 1 December 2020: “Making peace with nature is the crucial task of the 21st century. It must be a top priority for everyone, everywhere.”
Following the latest alarming reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Guterres declared: “These reports must sound the death knell for coal and fossil fuels before they destroy our planet. If we join forces now, we can still avert the climate catastrophe.”
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The UN Secretary-General has just warned of “climate hell” at a UN climate summit: “We are playing Russian roulette with our planet… We need an exit from the highway to climate hell.” The world’s highest-ranking politician speaks plainly like no other when it comes to the climate catastrophe.
May 2024 was the twelfth consecutive month in which the global average temperature reached a record high for the month in question, according to the EU climate change service Copernicus.
In light of these warnings, Guterres even called for a global funding and advertising boycott of the gas, coal and oil industries. Governments should ban advertising by the entire fossil fuel industry, similar to tobacco advertising. Financial institutions should invest in renewable energies instead. Guterres called the fossil fuel industry the “godfathers of climate chaos”. They had blocked progress towards climate-friendly energy for decades.
“Billions of dollars have been spent distorting the truth, deceiving the public and sowing doubt,” said the world’s highest-ranking politician. At the same time, he suggested the introduction of levies on shipping, aviation and the fuel industry.
“Many in the fossil fuel industry have been shamelessly greenwashing and trying to delay climate action – with lobbying, legal threats and gigantic advertising campaigns… We cannot accept a future in which the rich are protected in climate-controlled bubbles while the rest of humanity is ravaged by deadly weather in uninhabitable countries,” said Guterres.
After his speech, Guterres said that every individual must get involved: In elections, to bring politicians to power who were serious about climate change and through their own commitment to more climate protection. He thanked the young people who were doing this. “You are on the right side of history,” he said. “Carry on.”
Quelle
FRANZ ALT 2024 | Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
