Youth Bring Gandhi to the Fore at COP-15

[Aunty Kamala]

Today, on the 37th Day of the Climate Justice Fast by Anna Keenan of AU and Sara Svensson of Sweden, and on the 6th Day of negotiations at the COP-15, estimates of over 100,000 people marched in a peaceful protest from Copenhagen City to the Bella Center where the talks are being held here in Denmark. Once there, they held a candle-light vigil. Police arrested about 60 people, tying them together, then tying their hands behind their backs, making them sit in long rows, although there was no violence.

Youth leader Deepa Gupta, the initiator of IYCN the Indian Youth Climate Network that has for two years brought a delegation of Indian Youth to the COP negotiations, gave a passionate and stirring speech to the massive gathering, exhorting them to feel and respond to the terrible penance of the Climate Justice Fasters, now in its 37th day. The call was on the side of humanity, the unborn and the natural Creation, calling for commitment and determination to awaken awareness throughout the planet of the dangers facing mankind if we do not change our patterns of development, our relationship to the Earth. To not settle for less, here at the UNFCCC COP-15.

In the final session of SBSTA, (the Subsidary Body for Scientific and Technical Advice to the COP) the International Youth Climate Movement was allowed to speak at the end of the session for 90 seconds. Spokesman Linkesh Diwan, invoked Gandhi to the leaders in his address saying:

Thank you Madam Chair,
Respected negotiators, my name is Linkesh Diwan.
On behalf of the International Youth Climate Movement, I speak for 2 . 2 billion
people, the children on this Earth.
We demand that forests be preserved in their natural purity, rightfully protected by
International Law, and kept out of the carbon market. Take the brackets off our future.
Forests are more than carbon sinks. Forests provide homes, food, soil, clean water, for
diverse life forms. Forests are different from plantations. Forested lands, all lands,
must be held in trust by and for the local or indigenous peoples that depend upon them.
REDD, (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) as it stands, presents a huge danger to human rights, natural forests and the climate.
This we can not accept.
As youth we fear your plans for us. Seeking Climate Justice, some of us have been
fasting and praying for 37 days on water only. We are desperate.
To avoid a disastrous outcome from COP15, we demand that any agreement
must include:
• a clear definition, and distinction between plantations and natural forests;
• explicit language protecting intact natural forests, and ensuring conservation of
biological diversity;
• accounting for emissions from peat soils and other ecosystems;
• safeguards for the rights of local and indigenous peoples;
• and we need to address the causes for continued forest destruction.
Dear Leaders, before you make your decisions, please ask yourselves: what would
Mahatma Gandhi do? Please do that.
Thank You

The Youth of the Earth are clinging to the ideals of Gandhi for planetary and resource governance and management, to help them redefine their relationship to the Earth. They all recognise that development that licences greed can no longer be called development.
Will adults, elected and unelected leaders wake up to their call?