Climate crisis: politicians must find just solutions

At the end of the first week of the UN climate conference in Bonn, 50 young activists from Young Friends of the Earth Europe and Friends of the Earth International called for the leaders to be “kept behind after school” for their failure to take action to achieve fair solutions to the climate crisis.

Activists wearing masks with the faces of government leaders took their place in a classroom built outside the Maritim Hotel in Bonn.

The leaders will be forced to write out that they must commit to reduce their carbon emission by at least 40% by 2020, to repay their climate debt and to promise not to invest in offsets, coal and nuclear.

Friends of the Earth International is critical of the role that industrialised countries are playing in the UN climate negotiations, by avoiding taking action at home, promoting carbon offsetting and other false solutions to the climate crisis.

Claire Prizeman, a Young Friends of the Earth Europe activist said: “Rich countries must do their homework and promise to radically cut their emissions and give up on false solutions like offsetting, so-called clean coal and nuclear if we are to have any hope of avoiding catastrophic climate change. Rich countries have to live up their historical responsibilities and act now for climate justice.”

Friends of the Earth International also remains critical of the undue influence of the private sector and the World Bank in the UN climate negotiations, which must remain the domain of governments and civil society. Governments have the responsibility to ensure that people and the planet are protected from climate change.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT IN BON, GERMANY

Joseph Zacune, Friends of the Earth International Climate Coordinator, Tel: +44 79 67 87 75 93 (UK mobile number)

Asad Rehman, Senior Campaigner, Friends of the Earth England, Wales and Northern Ireland, Mobile: +44 77201 47280

High quality images available at: www.flickr.com/photos/ActNow09