On Friday, September 23rd, 2022, Fridays for Future is going out on the streets across the world to demand climate finance and reparations for Loss and Damages. This is in time for the upcoming UN Climate Summit, COP 27 in Egypt.
From strikes outside fossil fuel companies to protests in different countries about upcoming or recent elections, young people continue to strike and come together around the world to fight for climate justice.
Youth strikers are fighting for climate reparations and justice not as charity, but as a transformative justice process in which political power will return to the people and the communities.
According to the strikers, reparations cannot come in loans, but instead must be follow-throughs on the demands from Indigenous and marginalised communities: to get their lands back and to give resources for adaptation and Loss and Damages to those most affected by the climate crisis.
Strikers call for redistribution of global wealth, technology and information, and political power both from the Global North to the Global South and from the richest to the most marginalised.
“Youth are tired of hearing the well-worded lies sowed by the publicists of big oil and even bigger governments that back them up. This time, we will take to the streets to not just put forth our demands but to create larger systems of love, empathy, and community care that will benefit people over profit.
“We are here to demand climate reparations for the Most Affected People and Areas. Global North governments should pay for the loss and damages in our communities, not out of a sense of solidarity, but because it’s their historical responsibility, and we are here to claim that debt,” said Edwin Namakanda, a climate activist from Uganda.
They added that they have come together to demand leaders and policymakers prioritise #PeopleNotProfit, and “we will keep coming together for our shared vision of a better planet that is equitable towards all its inhabitants”
Expected strike locations include US, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Japan, Austria, Chile, Kenya, Indonesia, Mexico, Sweden, India, Philippines, Argentina, Brazil, Bangladesh, Ecuador, Colombia, Bulgaria, Sierra Leone, Belgium, Algeria, Serbia, Switzerland and Scotland.
