Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Climate change protests
A woman holds a poster Friday during a climate protest in Milan, northern Italy. Demonstrators worldwide turned out to demand action on climate change.
BERLIN — Students in Italy symbolically torched a replica of planet Earth on Friday, part of a second wave of worldwide protests demanding swifter action to fight climate change.
In Italy’s financial hub of Milan, tens of thousands of people took to the streets and later gathered around a giant globe to watch it go up in flames.
More than 100,000 people also rallied in the Italian capital, Rome.
Fears about the effect of climate change on younger generations drew fresh protests in India, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands, a week after hundreds of thousands rallied worldwide ahead of the United Nations General Assembly this week.
In New Zealand, students marched on Parliament in Wellington, staging one of the largest protests ever held in that capital.
In Berlin, activists from the Fridays for Future group braved persistent rain to denounce a package of measures that the German government recently agreed on to cut the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. Experts say the proposal falls far short of what’s needed if the world’s sixth-biggest emitter is to meet the goals of the landmark 2015 Paris climate accord.
Actor Javier Bardem joined dozens of young people in San Sebastian in one of several demonstrations and rallies held across Spain on Friday morning. Bardem was promoting a documentary he worked on with Greenpeace.
The youth climate movement has drawn criticism from some who accuse the students of overreacting and say they would be better off going to school. But Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, who sparked the protests, said children and teenagers taking part in the climate protests are just acting directly on the science that she says underpins climate change.