Activist remains critical of a process that’s left the world’s efforts on global warming ‘still speeding in the wrong direction’.
By Aaron Rutkoff
[Greta] Thunberg’s participation in this year’s climate summit — her first appearance since the 2021 talks in Glasgow, Scotland — hasn’t been widely publicized, and she described herself as skeptical of the proceedings. “We’ve had 31 COPs now, and we’re still speeding in the wrong direction,” she said in an interview in the lengthy queue for credentials that allow access to the UN-controlled blue zone, where negotiations will take place over the next two weeks.
She’s often upbraided diplomats and world leaders for their lack of urgency, including an incendiary 2019 speech at UN headquarters that laid the blame on adult inaction on global warming for “stealing her childhood.” She still sees the political and business leaders who turn out for climate talks as primarily engaged in greenwashing — and expressed concern over the Turkish host government’s record on human rights.
“As long as we don’t focus on the real crisis, we are losing time,” she said Monday. “And that means more lives we’ll never have back.”
At past climate summits, Thunberg has attracted attention for her efforts to travel in ways that minimize greenhouse gas emissions — which means avoiding airplanes. To reach Antalya by Nov. 9, she left London on Nov. 3 on a journey of “trains, buses and sleep deprivation,” she said.
Her concern for the inadequacy of the COP process hasn’t changed over the years. In fact, it’s even become a widespread view among those who participate the talks. But there are new issues this year that haven’t been a major part of the mix at prior COPs, most notably the spread of artificial intelligence and the backlash against data centers.
