Category Archives: Greta Thunberg

Pandemic shows climate has never been treated as crisis, say scientists

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Letter also signed by Greta Thunberg urges EU leaders to act immediately on global heating

Greta Thunberg and some of the world’s leading climate scientists have written to EU leaders demanding they act immediately to avoid the worst impacts of the unfolding climate and ecological emergency.

The letter, which is being sent before a European council meeting starting on Friday, says the Covid-19 pandemic has shown that most leaders are able to act swiftly and decisively, but the same urgency had been missing in politicians’ response to the climate crisis.

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‘Tipping point’: Greta Thunberg hails Black Lives Matter protests

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People are realising ‘we cannot keep looking away from these things’, says climate activist

Greta Thunberg has said the Black Lives Matter protests show society has reached a tipping point where injustice can no longer be ignored, but that she believes a “green recovery plan” from the coronavirus pandemic will not be enough to solve the climate crisis.

Reflecting on the protests that have swept the globe in recent weeks, the Swedish climate activist told the BBC: “It feels like we have passed some kind of social tipping point where people are starting to realise that we cannot keep looking away from these things. We cannot keep sweeping these things under the carpet, these injustices.

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Andrew Bolt’s column mocking Greta Thunberg breached standards, press watchdog finds

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News Corp columnist accuses Australian Press Council of sabotaging debate and doubles down by repeating slurs about Thunberg’s autism

Andrew Bolt’s mocking column about Greta Thunberg, which referred to the young climate campaigner as “deeply disturbed” and “freakishly influential”, breached standards and was likely to cause substantial distress, offence and prejudice, the press watchdog has found.

The Australian Press Council ruled that the language in Bolt’s August 2019 article breached standards because it attempted to “diminish the credibility of Ms Thunberg’s opinions on the basis of her disabilities and by pillorying her supporters on the basis of her disabilities”.

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Young climate activists call for EU to radically reform farming sector

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Fridays for Future to publish letter urging reform of common agricultural policy ahead of European commission meeting

The EU’s farming sector needs radical reform, and the common agricultural policy (CAP) must be rewritten if the climate crisis is to be tackled, a group of young climate activists will urge.

Fridays for Future, founded by teenagers in the wake of Greta Thunberg’s school strikes, will confront the European commission’s vice-president, Frans Timmermans, online to call for new plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, and replace subsidies based on the amount of land farmed with payments for farmers supplying public goods, such as clean water, clean air and lower carbon emissions.

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Greta Thunberg and children’s group hit back at attempt to throw out climate case

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Brazil, France and Germany say UN can’t hear complaint against five countries of flouting child rights to clean air

Greta Thunberg and a group of other children have pushed forward their legal complaint at the UN against countries they accuse of endangering children’s wellbeing through the climate crisis, despite attempts to have it thrown out.

The 16 children, including the Swedish environmental activist, lodged a legal case with the UN committee on the rights of the child against Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany and Turkey last September.

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Earth Day: Greta Thunberg calls for ‘new path’ after pandemic

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Climate activist says Covid-19 outbreak shows change can happen when we listen to scientists

Greta Thunberg has urged people around the world to take a new path after the coronavirus pandemic, which she said proved “our society is not sustainable”.

The Swedish climate activist said the strong global response to Covid-19 demonstrated how quickly change could happen when humanity came together and acted on the advice of scientists.

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Russian hoax raises questions over Sussexes’ security

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Royal expert sounds alarm after Prince Harry seemingly duped into thinking he was talking to Greta Thunberg

Russian hoaxers who apparently tricked Prince Harry into offering help to take penguins to the North Pole have raised serious questions over security and screening measures for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex as they leave the royal fold, a royal expert said.

Posing as the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg and her father, hoaxers Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexey Stolyarov managed to reach Harry on his landline at his rented Vancouver Island mansion on New Year’s Eve and on 22 January, it has been reported.

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EU member states call for 2030 climate target

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Dozen member states hope letter will focus minds before Glasgow UN talks this year

A dozen countries have called for an EU climate target for 2030 to be drawn up “as soon as possible”, if the bloc is to galvanise the rest of the world before vital UN talks in Glasgow later this year.

In a letter to the EU’s top official on climate action, Frans Timmermans, the dozen EU member states say “the EU can lead by example and contribute to creating the international momentum needed for all parties to scale up their ambition” by adopting a 2030 EU greenhouse gas emissions reduction target “as soon as possible and by June 2020 at the latest”.

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Naomi Seibt: ‘anti-Greta’ activist called white nationalist an inspiration

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German teenager spoke at an event at US rightwing conference CPAC

A young campaigner who has been hailed by climate sceptics as the right’s answer to Greta Thunberg has previously described a white nationalist who appeared to promote “white genocide” theories as one of her “inspirations”.

Naomi Seibt, a 19-year-old from Münster, Germany, who styles herself as a “climate realist”, has also had to deny she made remarks that could be seen as antisemitic following an attack on a synagogue last year.

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Greta Thunberg and Malala Yousafzai meet at Oxford University

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Swedish climate activist visits Yousafzai’s college while in UK for Bristol youth protest

The teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg has met Malala Yousafzai at the University of Oxford where the Nobel peace prize winner is a student.

Yousafzai, 22, posted a photo on Instagram of herself and Thunberg sitting on a bench with their arms around each other on Tuesday, with the caption: “Thank you, @gretathunberg” and a heart emoji.

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Greta Thunberg’s mother reveals teenager’s troubled childhood

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Swedish opera singer Malena Ernman gives emotional account of daughter’s battles with autism and an eating disorder

Greta Thunberg’s extraordinary transformation from a near-mute 11-year-old into the world’s most powerful voice on the climate crisis is revealed today by her mother.

Related: Malena Ernman: ‘Greta was the child, we were the emperor. And we were all naked’

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Greta Thunberg files application to trademark her name

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Climate activist also applied to register name of climate movement Fridays for Future

The climate activist Greta Thunberg has said she has applied to register her name and that of the Fridays For Future movement she founded in 2018, which has gone global and catapulted her to international fame.

The move would allow legal action against persons or companies trying to use her name which are not in line with her values or that of her movement, she said.

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Africa is humanitarian ‘blind spot’: the world’s top 10 forgotten crises – report

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Climate emergency is fuelling drought, food poverty and disaster in the global south but humanitarian crises under-reported

The African continent is a “blind spot” for coverage of the humanitarian crises that are being fuelled by the climate emergency, according to a new analysis [pdf].

Madagascar’s chronic food crisis, where 2.6 million people were affected by drought in 2019, came top of the list of 10 of the most under-reported crises last year, Care International’s annual survey found.

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Trump blasts ‘prophets of doom’ in attack on climate activism

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Comment came as Greta Thunberg demanded immediate action in Davos

Donald Trump told the world’s business leaders to stop listening to “prophets of doom” as he used a keynote speech at the World Economic Forum to attack the teenage activist Greta Thunberg over her climate crisis warnings.

The US president hailed America’s growth record and compared campaigners against global heating with those who feared a population explosion in the 1960s and mass starvation in the 1970s.

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Climate activist turns down Siemens’ offer of seat on energy board

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Protest group leader Luisa Neubauer says she would lose right to criticise the company

The leader of Germany’s Friday for Future climate protests has said she turned down a seat on the board of Siemens’ new energy business amid growing anger over its role in a controversial coal mining project in Australia as she feared she would lose the right to criticise the company.

Luisa Neubauer, 23, the German face of the campaign group inspired by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who has campaigned alongside her, said on Monday the position would jeopardise her independence if she had taken up the offer from its chief executive, Joe Kaeser, made at a meeting in Berlin on Friday.

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Roger Federer responds to climate change criticism from Greta Thunberg

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  • Credit Suisse closely linked with fossil fuel industry
  • #RogerWakeUpNow has been trending on Twitter

Roger Federer has issued a cautiously worded response to mounting criticism, including from climate activist Greta Thunberg, over his sponsorship deal with Credit Suisse.

A dozen Swiss activists appeared in court on Tuesday after refusing to pay a fine for playing tennis inside branches of Credit Suisse bank in November 2018, in a stunt intended to underscore Federer’s relationship with the Swiss financial giant, which is closely linked with the fossil fuel industry.

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One year to save the planet: a simple guide to fighting the climate crisis in 2020

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Veganism might help and it’s always good to avoid flying. But the answer to Earth’s emergency must involve political, collective action – and there are countless ways to get active

The impact of the climate crisis is all too visible. Bushfires have killed more than 20 people in south-eastern Australia and forced thousands more to flee their homes. Floods and storms have left hundreds dead and many more destitute in Argentina, Uruguay, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Malawi. And in the UK, record temperatures were seen last summer and this winter.

Last year, people across the world took to the streets to demand goverments act to slash greenhouse gas emissions. Did you watch and wonder what you could do to help the global climate movement?

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Greta Thunberg changes Twitter name to Sharon after quiz show error

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Actor Amanda Henderson answered ‘Sharon’ to Thunberg-related question on Celebrity Mastermind – and the teen activist loved it

Greta Thunberg has been mocked and called many names since becoming the world’s most famous climate activist.

Related: Greta Thunberg: 'I wouldn't have wasted my time' speaking to Trump

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Greta Thunberg: climate activism has made her ‘very happy’, says father

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Svante Thunberg says he was concerned about his daughter’s school strike but that her campaigning had helped her beat depression

Greta Thunberg’s father has opened up about how activism helped his daughter out of depression but still worries about how she will deal with the impact of her international fame.

Speaking to the BBC to mark his daughter’s guest-editing slot on the Today programme, Svante Thunberg revealed he thought it was a “bad idea” for Greta to stage the school strike that catapulted her into the public eye.

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2019: the year in US protests – in pictures

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Tens of thousands of teachers walked off the job in Los Angeles, American women gathered for their third annual march in Washington, Iowans protested abortion bans, Texans declared Donald Trump ‘not welcome’ in El Paso and students in New York City rallied around Greta Thunberg in calling for action on climate change

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