Note: Nope, that headline is not from GJEP. In fact it’s the title of one of the videos shot by the Media Co-op in Montreal during the Durban meetings of the UN climate negotiations. Their Canadian network spans: The Dominion • Halifax • Vancouver • Montreal • Toronto. There is a lot of controversy surrounding the action this video documents, including GJEP’s Anne Petermann’s scathing post on Friday “Showdown at the Durban Disaster: Challenging the ‘Big Green’ Patriarchy.” GJEP and Anne are receiving many comments and emails, both pro and con on Anne’s article. To those who disagree with Anne’s analysis: please watch this. To everyone else, let’s have a laugh, albeit a sad one, and resolve to up the ante for the people and the planet with concrete, meaningful action and analysis, and make Climate Justice! more than just two words to chant. After Copenhagen COP 15, many of us lost a long time friend and comrade, Dennis Brutus: poet, scholar and anti-apartheid activist. If Dennis was still physically present, I believe he would have linked arms with Anne and Keith; Dennis knew what struggle meant. For more Media Co-op coverage of Durban, please go to http://mediacoop.ca/durban. -Orin Langelle for the GJEP Team
Category Archives: Carbon Trading
Video: Climate Justice Outcry! Dudes co-opt COP 17 final march
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Filed under Actions / Protest, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, False Solutions to Climate Change, Independent Media, Media
Radio Interview: Soils and Agriculture in the Carbon Market on KPFK Los Angeles
Teresa Anderson of the Gaia Foundation is interviewed on the Sojourner Truth show on KPFK on Wednesday December 7th about the impacts on Africa of including agriculture in the Durban climate talks, and turning agriculture into a new carbon offset.
Global Justice Ecology Project partners with the Sojourner Truth show on KPFK Los Angeles for a weekly Earth Minute and weekly interviews with activists on key environmental and ecological justice issues. In addition, during major events such as the UN Climate Conference in Durban, South Africa, we organize daily interviews Tuesday through Thursday.
To listen, click on the link below and scroll to minute 27:39.
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Filed under Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Corporate Globalization, False Solutions to Climate Change, Food Sovereignty, Land Grabs, REDD, UNFCCC
Indigenous Peoples Condemn Climate Talks Fiasco and Demand Moratoria on REDD+
December 13, 2011 – Indigenous leaders returning from Durban, South Africa condemn the fiasco of the United Nations climate change talks and demand a moratorium on a forest carbon offset scheme called REDD+ which they say threatens the future of humanity and Indigenous Peoples’ very survival. During the UN climate negotiations, a Global Alliance of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities against REDD+ and for Life was formed to bring attention to the lack of full recognition of Indigenous rights being problematic in the texts of the UN climate negotiations.
“It was very disappointing that our efforts to strengthen the vague Indigenous rights REDD safeguards from the Cancun Agreements evaporated as the Durban UN negotiations went on. It is clear that the focus was not on strong, binding commitments on Indigenous rights and safeguards, nor limiting emissions, but on creating a framework for financing and carbon markets, which they did. Now Indigenous Peoples’ forests may really be up for grabs,” says Alberto Saldamando, legal counsel participating in the Indigenous Environmental Network delegation.
Berenice Sanchez of the Mesoamerica Indigenous Women’s Biodiversity Network says, “Instead of cutting greenhouse gas emissions 80% like we need, the UN is promoting false solutions to climate change like carbon trading and offsets, through the Clean Development Mechanism and the proposed REDD+ which provide polluters with permits to pollute. The UN climate negotiation is not about saving the climate, it is about privatization of forests, agriculture and the air.”
Tom Goldtooth, Director of Indigenous Environmental Network based in Minnesota, USA does not mince words. “By refusing to take immediate binding action to reduce the concentration of greenhouse gas emissions, industrialized countries like the United States and Canada are essentially incinerating Africa and drowning the small island states of the Pacific. The sea ice of the Inupiat, Yupik and Inuit of the Arctic is melting right before their eyes, creating a forced choice to adapt or perish. This constitutes climate racism, ecocide and genocide of an unprecedented scale.”
Of particular concern for indigenous peoples is a forest offset scheme known as REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation). Hyped as a way of saving the climate and paying communities to take care of forests as sponges for Northern pollution, REDD+ is rife with fundamental flaws that make it little more than a green mask for more pollution and the expansion of monoculture tree plantations. The Global Alliance of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities against REDD+ and for Life, formed at the Durban UN climate negotiations, call for an immediate moratorium on REDD+-type projects because they fear that REDD+ could result in “the biggest land grab of all time,” thus threatening the very survival of indigenous peoples and local communities.
“At Durban, CDM and REDD carbon and emission offset regimes were prioritized, not emission reductions. All I saw was the UN, World Bank, industrialized countries and private investors marketing solutions to market pollution. This is unacceptable. The solutions for climate change must not be placed in the hands of financiers and corporate polluters. I fear that local communities could increasingly become the victims of carbon cowboys, without adequate and binding mechanisms to ensure that the rights of indigenous peoples and local forested and agricultural communities are respected,” Goldtooth added.
“We call for an immediate moratorium on REDD+-type policies and projects because REDD is a monster that is already violating our rights and destroying our forests,” Monica González of the Kukapa People and Head of Indigenous Issues of the Mexican human rights organization Comision Ciudadana de Derechos Humanos del Noreste.
The President of the Ogiek Council of Elders of the Mau Forest of Kenya, Joseph K. Towett, said “We support the moratorium because anything that hurts our cousins, hurts us all.”
“We will not allow our sacred Amazon rainforest to be turned into a carbon dump. REDD is a hypocrisy that does not stop global warming,” said Marlon Santi, leader of the Kichwa community of Sarayaku, Ecuador and long time participant of UN and climate change meetings.
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NO REDD Resources http://noredd.makenoise.org/
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Filed under Biodiversity, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Corporate Globalization, False Solutions to Climate Change, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabs, Pollution, REDD, UNFCCC
Protesters Expelled From UN Climate Conference Hall
Cross-posted from Environmental News Service
DURBAN, South Africa, December 9, 2011 (ENS) – Demonstrators calling for “Climate Justice Now” interrupted climate negotiations today in Durban on what was to have been the last official day of the annual United Nations climate conference as agreement contined to elude negotiators.
After government delegates from around the world talked without resolution until nearly midnight, officials called it a night and decided to reconvene for further talks at 10:00 am Saturday morning.
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Head of the U.S. delegation to Durban Todd Stern, left, with China’s head of delegation, Xie Zhenhua. (Photo courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin) |
A special type of meeting indigenous to Southern Africa, known as an Indaba, is continuing until 4:00 am to resolve outstanding issues. At an Indaba, everyone has a voice and there is an attempt to find common ground.
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Conference President Maite Nkoana-Mashabane(Photo courtesy ENB) |
Conference President, South African Foreign Affairs Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, said, “The Parties are engaging genuinely and working very hard to ensure that agreement is reached on the matters before the conference. Parties are looking at convergences, guided by trust and a spirit of give-and-take.”
The Parties are considering their options “in relation to the issue of the Second Commitment Period of the Kyoto Protocol and future process” as well as long-term finance “with specific reference to the operationalization of the Green Climate Fund,” she said.
“Parties are expressing the hope that the Green Climate Fund can be launched here in Durban,” she said of the multi-billion dollar fund to help developing countries cope with climate impacts agreed in principle at last year’s UN climate conference in Cancun, Mexico.
“The various groups, including the Association of Small Island States, the Least Developed Countries, the European Union and the Africa Group are moving towards common ground on various aspects of the negotiations. Other parties are coming on board. Despite these positive sentiments, we are still not there yet,” Nkoana-Mashabane said.
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Protesters block the halls at the Durban International Conference Center, December 9, 2011 (Photo courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin) |
Meanwhile, civil society activists erupted in protest this afternoon, blocking the plenary halls and bursting into chants of “Climate Justice Now!” “Don’t Kill Africa!” “World Bank out of Climate Finance,” “No Carbon Trading,” and “No REDD!”
When UN Security began to remove the activists, Anne Petermann, executive director of the Vermont-based Global Justice Ecology Project, sat down. When she was asked to leave willingly, she refused to comply. While others were escorted out, Petermann refused to go, until she was lifted into a wheelchair, and rolled out of the conference center.
Petermann sent a statement to a press conference held by Climate Justice Now!, a coalition she co-founded in 2007.
“I took this action today because I believe this process is corrupt, this process is bankrupt, and this process is controlled by the One Percent,” Petermann said using language of the Occupy Movement.
“If meaningful action on climate change is to happen, it will need to happen from the bottom up,” she said. “The action I took today was to remind us all of the power of taking action into our own hands. With the failure of states to provide human leadership, and the corporate capture of the United Nations process, direct action by the ninety-nine percent is the only avenue we have left.”
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Anne Petermann of the Global Justice Ecology Project (Photo courtesy Global Forest Coalition) |
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Journalist Rana Karuna of Mauritius on the beach in Durban (Photo byChangeandSwitch) |
Also removed from the hall was Karuna Rana, a young woman from Mauritius, who refused to leave willingly. Rana is in Durban with a group of young journalists called Speak Your Mind.
Standing with Petermann in the rain at “Speaker’s Corner,” the Occupy site outside the Conference Center, Rana said, “I went to the protest action to take a picture, but I got emotionally empowered and I started to take part. I am the only young Mauritian here, so I found it my responsibility to speak on behalf of Mauritius, of small islands, and of global youth.”
“I’m scared for my future. Mauritius is a small island state and it’s terribly unfair to have no voice in this process,” said Rana. “If I did not take a stand, my voice would not have reached the negotiators.”
Desmond D’Sa, of South Durban Community Environmental Alliance, who also was expelled, said, “We cannot wait for 2020, as that will result in millions being displaced or dying in poverty due to extreme climatic conditions.”
Kumi Naidoo, Greenpeace International Executive Director, and other Greenpeacers also were escorted out after the protest action inside the International Conference Center.
A South African human rights activist among those who battled apartheid and won, Naidoo wrote online today in an open letter to climate negotiators, “Now, twenty years after our victory, in the remaining hours of the Durban climate talks, with great urgency we call for a similar breakthrough – one as unexpected, as deserved and as vital as South Africa’s transition to democracy.”
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Kumi Naidoo, head of Greenpeace International, second from right, and other protesters are removed from the conference center by UN security, December 9, 2011 (Photo courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin) |
“You may not have felt it inside the rarefied air-conditioned corridors of the conference centre, but a restless anger stalks this land – an anger driven by a new apartheid that has trapped close to half of humanity in a deadly embrace of poverty, inequality and hunger,” wrote Naidoo.
“Our institutions – local, national and global, across public and private sectors – are rapidly losing legitimacy,” Naidoo wrote. “A mistrust that is driven by the human greed of a minority has plundered the hopes and aspirations of the majority. People sense it at a visceral level, this year alone it has toppled dictators, and someday soon – perhaps not this year or the next, but someday soon – the victims of rising temperatures will similarly find their voice.
“Your job is to meet their hopes before you meet their anger.”
Mike Ballile of Greenpeace International was also escorted out of the conference center. Ballile wrote online just after 11 pm, “We were told our chants of “2020 too late,” could be heard as the lame U.S. proposal for implementation after 2020 was rejected. We wanted vulnerable countries to know that we support their fight, and climate laggards to feel a little more pressure and from what we hear that’s exactly what happened.”
“The peaceful protest carried on until we were removed by UN police, de-badged, and escorted out the ICC,” wrote Ballile. “I walked out with other young people from Egypt, the Maldives and South Africa, and we were happy to have taken a stand and raised our voices to the injustice we had witnessed.”
Hopes for a fair deal in Durban are sinking, said Ballile. “But for a few hours this afternoon, in the heart of the conference centre, the governments were forced to listen to the people and not the polluters and our message was clear: act on climate change now!”
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Global Justice Ecology Project Director Anne Petermann Ejected from COP17
Delegates from Mauritius, South Africa, and Elsewhere Expelled as Well
GJEP's Anne Petermann (right) and GEAR's Keith Brunner (both sitting) before their forced removal. Photo: Langelle/GJEP
December 9, 2011, Durban, South Africa – Civil society activists erupted into protest in the halls of the UN Climate Summit this afternoon, blocking the plenary halls and bursting into chants of “Climate Justice Now!”, “Don’t Kill Africa!”, “World Bank out of Climate Finance, “No Carbon Trading,” and “No REDD!” When UN Security began to remove the activists, Anne Petermann, Executive Director of GJEP, sat down. When she was asked to leave willingly, she refused to comply. While others were escorted out, Petermann, and GEAR’s Keith Brunner refused to go. Brunner was carried out and Petermann was lifted into a wheelchair, and rolled out of the Conference Center.
Close by was Karuna Rana, a 23 year-old woman from Mauritius, who similarly refused to comply.
Crowd scene in the hallway. Photo: Langelle
Petermann sent the following statement to a press conference held by Climate Justice Now!, a coalition co-founded in 2007 by Petermann and GJEP:
“I took this action today because I believe this process is corrupt, this process is bankrupt, and this process is controlled by the One percent. If meaningful action on climate change is to happen, it will need to happen from the bottom up. The action I took today was to remind us all of the power of taking action into our own hands. With the failure of states to provide human leadership, and the corporate capture of the United Nations process, direct action by the ninety-nine percent is the only avenue we have left.”
On hearing the news of Petermann’s expulsion, Flora Mmereki, of Botswana, who also took part in the spontaneous protest, said, “It really broke my heart seeing Anne taken out in a wheelchair, because she was acting for climate justice. It is so, so sad to see how they are treating people who stand up for humanity.”
Karuna Rana, at the action earlier in the day. Photo: Langelle
Karuna Rana, of Mauritius, is in Durban with a group of young journalists called Speak Your Mind. Runa, standing with Petermann in the rain at “Speaker’s Corner,” the Occupy site outside the Conference Center, explained her motivation: “I went to the protest action to take a picture, but I got emotionally empowered and I started to take part. I am the only young Mauritian here, so I found it my responsibility to speak on behalf of Mauritius, of small islands, and of global youth. I’m scared for my future. Mauritius is a small island state and it’s terribly unfair to have no voice in this process. If I did not take a stand, my voice would not have reached the negotiators.”
Petermann said, “We willingly took this action that cost us our credentials because we know that the only time to act is now. We hope that our refusal to move – our refusal to comply with the bankrupt UNFCCC process – will inspire others to take action in support of a new world – a transformed world that will be rooted in justice and in harmony with the earth.”
Emotions were high during the protest. Photo: Langelle
Petermann will sit out the rest of COP17 at the Speakers’ Corner, as global decision-makers come to the most likely outcome of these negotiations: a new non-binding legal framework, to begin in 2015, to begin voluntarily reducing emissions in 2020.
Local Desmond D’Sa, of South Durban Community Environmental Alliance, who was expelled as well, said, “We cannot wait for 2020, as that will result in millions being displaced or dying in poverty due to extreme climatic conditions.”
In other words, the talks have failed, the world powers are stalling for time, and the voice of civil society is locked out. Again.
Locked out, but for how long? Photo: Langelle
Filed under Actions / Protest, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Pollution, REDD, UNFCCC
WORT in Madison, Wisc. Interview on Status of Climate Talks in Durban, South Africa
GJEP Executive Director Anne Petermann was interviewed by Norm Stockwell on WORT’s Public Affairs program about the status of the UN Climate Conference in Durban, South Africa on Monday December 5th. To listen to the interview, click on the link below and scroll to minute 6:45.
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Negotiators are “Committing Ecocide” – says Pablo Solon in Durban Climate March
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Filed under Carbon Trading, Climate Change, False Solutions to Climate Change, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabs, Latin America-Caribbean, REDD, UNFCCC
Today: ACTION IN FRONT OF THE U.S. CONSULATE: “THE U.S. MUST STOP OBSTRUCTING CLIMATE JUSTICE FOR THE 99%”
A festive and peaceful action in front of the U.S. Consulate in Durban, as part of the 1000 Durbans Global Day of Action for Climate Justice. The action will feature speakers who will testify to the impacts of U.S. government and corporate pollution on their communities and land. Speakers will also share recommendations to the U.S. government and speak out against the positions that Jonathan Pershing and the State Department have taken thus far. The action will also feature powerful visuals for photographers and the broadcast media.
People from impacted communities within the U.S. and the Global South. Organized by the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJ) www.ggjalliance.org, a multi-sector alliance of U.S.-based community organizing groups building an international movement for peace, democracy and a sustainable world. Speakers Include:
Ahmina Maxey, Zero Waste and the East Michigan Environmental Action Coalition (Detroit) Francisca Porchas, Labor Community Strategy Center and the Bus Riders Union (Los Angeles) Chavanne Jean-Baptiste, Peasant Movement of Papaye and La Via Campesina (Haiti) Francois Paulette, Smith’s Landing Treaty 8 Dene First Nation, Indigenous Environmental Network (Alberta, Canada)
“We won’t let the U.S. off the hook,” says Ahmina Maxey of the East Michigan Environmental Action Coalition, a lead organization of GGJ. “As members of communities disproportionately affected by U.S. pollution and land grabs, we will be holding dirty U.S. corporations and the State Department accountable for the global mess they have made,”
“The U.S. government and associated corporations are the 1% responsible for the majority of pollution affecting the 99% of the world, including the 99% in Los Angeles,” says Francisca Porchas of the LA-based Labor Community Strategy Center, another lead organization of GGJ. “We will be taking action to demand that the U.S. immediately reduce carbon emissions to 50% of current levels by 2017, and to stop obstructing progress towards paying climate debt and forging an internationally binding deal.”
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Filed under Actions / Protest, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Corporate Globalization, Pollution, UNFCCC
