HOW DARE YOU, GRETA THUNDERS
Trump ignores activist teen at UN
SCHOOLGIRL activist Greta Thunberg berated and lectured world leaders in an emotive speech at the UN Climate Action Summit. But not before US President Donald Trump appeared to ignore the 16-year-old climate activist in the UN foyer. While video footage of the chance encounter shows the Swedish teen fixing Mr Trump with a steely gaze, Mr Trump breezed straight past her with his entourage. After the teen scolded world leaders, angrily at times almost breathlessly declaring “how dare you”, Mr Trump appeared to take aim at the young activist. In a seemingly mocking tweet, Mr Trump said: “She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!” Mr Trump, who has called climate change a Chinese hoax, was not present when Greta berated leaders, repeatedly saying: “How dare you.” “We are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is money and fairytales of eternal economic growth — how dare you,” she said in her clearly impassioned speech. Global heads of state, including French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, are in New York to make new pledges to curb globalwarming emissions. Greta, who travelled from Europe on a zeroemissions sailboat, started a lone protest outside the Swedish parliament more than a year ago that led to last Friday’s id ’ global climate strikes. “This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean,” she said.
“Yet you have come to us young people for hope. How dare you. You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words, and yet I’m one of the lucky ones.
“People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. You say you hear us, and that you understand the urgency ... I do not want to believe that. Because if you really understood the situation, and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil. And that I refuse to believe.”
She told the UN that even the strictest emission cuts being talked about only gives the world a 50 per cent chance of limiting future warming to another 0.4C from now, which is a global goal. Those odds are not good enough, she said.
“We will not let you get away with this,” Ms Thunberg continued. “Right now is where we draw the line.” Her speech was met with a stunned silence — then a rapturous applause.
She and 15 other children then filed a complaint with the UN alleging that five of the world’s major economies have violated their human rights by not taking adequate action to stop the unfolding climate crisis.
Leader after leader told the UN they will do more — but conceded it was not enough.