Famed climate activist Greta Thunberg has said that only people's power and a demand from the public on climate change will lead politicians to make the real changes required in order to save the planet.
Thunberg was speaking ahead of the COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, one of the largest conferences to ever take place on the subject of climate change, and certainly the biggest climate event since the Paris Agreement was agreed upon in the French capital in 2015.
Speaking to the BBC, Thunberg said:
"The change is going to come when people are demanding change. So we can't expect everything to happen at these conferences."
The teenager also encouraged politicians to:
"Be honest about where you are, how you have been failing, how you're still failing us... instead of trying to find solutions, real solutions that will actually lead somewhere, that would lead to a substantial change, fundamental change… In my view, success would be that people finally start to realise the urgency of the situation and realise that we are facing an existential crisis, and that we are going to need big changes, that we're going to need to uproot the system, because that's where the change is going to come. Unfortunately there are no climate leaders today, especially not in the so-called global north. But that doesn't mean that they can't suddenly decide that now we're going to take the process seriously."
Thunberg also hopes that the event will give voice to the voiceless and that she doesn't see herself as a 'celebrity', telling the BBC:
"I don't see myself as a climate celebrity, I see myself as a climate activist... I should be grateful because there are many, many people who don't have a platform and who are not being listened to, their voices are being oppressed and silenced. I'm a completely different person when I'm in private. I don't think people would recognise me in private. I'm not very serious in private. I appear very angry in the media, but I am silly in private."
Kevin Mtai, a climate justice campaigner from Kenya, also spoke to the British broadcaster stating a hope that the conference will listen to all voices:
"I hope this climate conference is going to be an inclusive conference, to include all voices in the talks. They need to use indigenous people in the talks, marginalised people in the talks, people from the most affected areas. It's very important for people from the global south to speak for themselves, not other parts of the globe to speak on their behalf. Because we are the ones who have been affected by climate change, so it's very important we can hear from our own people, with our own ideas, our own voice."
COP26 begins on November 1st in Scotland's largest city and third largest in the UK, and will be attended by the likes of Joe Biden, Barack Obama and other world leaders.
[Based on reporting by: BBC]
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