Drumbeg youngsters call for climate justice ahead of COP26
Young people in Drumbeg Parish are sending a message to world leaders, demanding ‘climate justice’ for developing countries ahead of make–or–break talks being held in Glasgow next month.
The six youngsters, all members of St Patrick’s Youth Group, are using their voices to demand action on climate change that takes account of the needs of low–income countries when world leaders meet at the United Nations’ climate conference, COP26.
The young people and their leaders took part in a Christian Aid–organised action, making origami paper boats on which they wrote their hopes and prayers for the summit. The paper boats symbolise that although we are all in the same storm, we aren’t in the same boat when it comes to dealing with the impacts of climate change. Richer countries like the UK and Ireland which have contributed most to the problem of climate change are well–placed to cope with its effects while people in developing countries are already experiencing intense heatwaves, prolonged drought, dangerous cyclones, calamitous flooding and devastating locust swarms. In developing countries, far from being a distant threat, climate change has for many years been destroying crops, homes and livelihoods.
The Drumbeg paper boats will join a Christian Aid ‘flotilla’ of thousands of ‘little boats’ being displayed in a Glasgow cathedral to coincide with the crucial summit, representing growing public demands for urgent action to avert runaway climate change.
Christian Aid and its supporters are making three key demands of negotiators at the summit:
- To increase financial support to the world’s poorest countries to confront the climate crisis.
- To take action to reduce carbon emissions in order to limit the rise in average global temperatures to 1.5C.
- To stop the expansion of fossil fuel energy and invest in clean energy.
Christian Aid Ireland Chief Executive Rosamond Bennett thanked the youngsters for sending a message to political leaders ahead of the Glasgow summit. She said:
“Concerned citizens and climate activists are coming together to demand real, immediate and lasting action to avert a climate catastrophe. When they meet in Glasgow, world leaders will be hearing their voices and the voices of millions more like them. The seas are rising but so are we.”
To send your message to world leaders meeting next month in Glasgow, follow the instructions in this link: www.caid.ie/cop26