Climate activist roasts MPs as protests continue
Protesters descended on London’s Parliament Square yesterday to demand that British lawmakers take action to stem climate change – and they got an assist from Greta Thunberg, the teenage Swedish activist who has sparked a global youth movement and led school climate strikes in 100 countries last month.
In speech to MPs at Westminster, Thunberg said her generation has been betrayed.
‘‘We probably don’t even have a future any more,’’ she said. ‘‘That future has been sold so that a small number of people can make unimaginable amounts of money. It was stolen from us every time you said, ‘The sky is the limit’.’’
Earlier, when asked what she would say to United States President Donald Trump, who has announced that the US will withdraw from the 2015 Paris agreement to limit carbon pollution, Thunberg replied: ‘‘There is nothing I could say. He must have scientists coming to talk to him all the time, so he is obviously not listening to the scientists.’’
The Metropolitan Police have deployed more than 10,000 officers to manage the climate protests. By yesterday, they had made more than 1000 arrests and charged 71 people with breaching public order, obstructing traffic or obstructing police.
Demonstrators, who have gathered under the banner of the group Extinction Rebellion, have blocked Waterloo Bridge over the Thames River and parked a pink sailboat at the intersection at Oxford Circus. They have camped at the Marble Arch and staged a ‘‘die-in’’ in the central hall at the Natural History Museum. They say the combined assault of habitat loss, species extinction, warming temperatures and sea level rise is an existential threat to humanity and the planet.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan, though, seemed to be reaching the limit of his tolerance.
‘‘I share the passion about tackling climate change of those protesting, and support the democratic right to peaceful and lawful protest,’’ he said. ‘‘But this is now taking a real toll on our city – our communities, businesses and police. This is counterproductive.’’