KATOWICE-- Representatives from Green Parties around the world, gathered for COP24 in Katowice, Poland, called for meaningful action to meet the clear challenge of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report on 1.5 degrees. Hosting the Press Conference was the Co-Chair of the Global Greens Parliamentarians Association and Leader of the Green Party of Canada, Elizabeth May. May who said “While the obstruction by the United States, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait made headlines, the reality is the COP24 agenda largely bypassed the IPCC 1.5 Special Report.”
“As peoples of the world gather to march for climate action, the governments gathered here in Poland are continuing to leave enhancing current NDCs to future COPs,” said Ewa Sufin-Jacquard, Director of the Polish Green Foundation.
The focus of governments has been on getting the Paris Rule Book with clear, transparent accountability on a wide range of issues.
“The young people of the world are demanding real action. It is our future that is being discounted and negotiated into oblivion,” said Kim van Sparrentak from the Global Young Greens.
“While the Paris Rule book is undoubtedly important, surely we were capable at this meeting of responding to the urgency of the IPCC warnings,” said Lisa Badum, Green Member of the German Bundestag. “Instead, we seem determined to prove correct the IPCC comment that the only ingredient missing to ensure our survival is political will.”
Greens note that those governments pushing back on climate action are the same ones who increasingly reject immigration, stoke fear of the “other,” and ignore the need for social justice and eradication of poverty. “In this, Greens are also united in demanding social justice, human rights and meeting the needs of the many,” said Dorothy Nalubega of the Uganda Greens.
It is clear that the most progressive countries working in this COP are those that have been formed with Greens in their governments. Ministers of climate, energy and environment from Sweden, New Zealand, and Luxembourg are playing prominent roles at this COP and are Green Party members.
“We hope for strong results from the 2019 European Parliamentary elections, from the federal election in Canada and elsewhere in the world where Greens are poised to make gains. We need Greens elected everywhere to have any hope of placing humanity on a pathway to a sustainable world,” said James Shaw, co-leader of the New Zealand Greens and Climate Change minister in the New Zealand Government.
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