Green protesters demanding more money to outfit climate change blocked the main entrance to the European Union headquarters in Brussels yesterday. Belgian police spokesman Christian De Coninck said police arrested over 350 demonstrators. “Save the climate, bail out the planet,” crooned the group of Greenpeace activists, who also chained themselves to gates outside the EU.
The United Nations plans to meet soon to find a successor to the Kyoto protocol, the main U.N. tool against global warming, and success could hinge on finding cash for the fund to persuade poor nations to help tackle the problem.
Thomas Henningsen, Greenpeace International climate campaigner said: “Finance ministers are giving billions of taxpayers’ money to failed banks, but we’re here to make sure they also put money on the table to tackle climate change. “If the planet was a bank they would bail it out.”
Poor nations blame rich countries for causing climate change and say they do not do enough to help the poor adapt, for example, they do not create crops that are resistant to drought or floods and don’t help build barriers to counter rising sea levels.
Greenpeace is asking the European governments to contribute 35 billion euros ($44 billion) a year to the climate fund for poor nations. Europe and the United States are seen as the main potential sources of finance, and the EU is now debating the size and source of its contribution.
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