‘Make the planet great again,’ say climate marchers
Thousands of people from around the world marched through Katowice, the southern Polish city that’s hosting this year’s UN climate talks, demanding that their governments take tougher action to curb global warming.
Protesters included farmers from Latin America, environmentalists from Asia, students from the United States and families from Europe, many of whom said climate change is already affecting their lives.
“Climate change is the thing that frightens me the most,” said Michal Dabrowski from Warsaw, who brought his young daughter to the march.
“I’m a father and it’s kind of crucial that she will have a decent life.”
Marchers gathered in one of Katowice’s main squares before setting off for the conference centre where delegates from almost 200 countries are haggling over the fine details of the 2015 Paris accord aimed at fighting climate change.
Some protesters were dressed as endangered orangutans while others wore breathing masks to highlight the air pollution in Katowice, which lies at the heart of Poland’s coal mining region of Silesia.
Chanting “Wake up! It’s time to save our home!” and holding banners including one reading “Make the planet great again,” protesters marched through Katowice accompanied by a heavy police presence. Israeli forces said they had uncovered another Hizbollah tunnel dug from Lebanon, an announcement that came shortly after troops fired at suspected members of the Lebanese militant group. The discovery makes this at least the second cross-border tunnel found since Israel launched an operation last week to detect and “neutralise” attack tunnels dug by the Iranian-backed group into northern Israel.