Young Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg shamed Norwegian and other Nordic leaders once again on Tuesday when she refused to accept the Nordic Council’s environmental prize. She scolded the leaders of all the Nordic countries, for having “the possibility to do the most” to reverse climate change, but “basically” doing nothing.
Thunberg called the award “a huge honour … but the climate movement does not need any more awards.” She urged “politicians and people in power” to instead “start to listen” to the scientists and “act in accordance with what the science says is needed to limit the global temperature rise to below 1.5 or even 2 degrees celsius.”
“The Nordic countries have a great reputation around the world when it comes to climate and environmental issues,” Thunberg wrote on social media. “There is no lack of bragging about this. But when it comes to our actual emissions and our ecological footprints per capita … then it’s a whole other story.”
Thunberg specifically singled out Norway, where “the government recently gave a record number of permits to look for new oil and gas.” She also noted how the recently opened Johan Sverdrup oil- and natural gas field “is expected to produce oil and natural gas for 50 years” that will generate huge amounts of global CO2 emissions. She noted how “the gap between what science says is needed” to limit the increase of global temerature rise … and politics that run the Nordic countries is gigantic.” She lamented that there are “still no signs whatsoever of the changes required.” No prize, she explained, could thus be accepted until politicians in the Nordic countries “start to act in accordance” with what’s needed to address climate change.
Norway’s Prime Minister Erna Solberg is among the Nordic leaders attending the 71st session of the Nordic Council meeting in Stockholm that runs through Thursday. Solberg had no immediate comment to Thunberg’s accusations.
newsinenglish.no staff
