COP 26

The UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow has been postponed.

The COP in Glasgow has been XR Scotland’s focal point for many months. Now the COVID19 emergency forces it to be held in 2021. We really hope that by the middle of next year this terrible health crisis will be over, that the ingenuity and collective efforts of humankind will have the solutions to overcome this virus.

But we also know that the ecological and climate emergency will not be over any time soon. We are glad the UNFCCC have acted decisively on the science for once, in choosing to delay the COP. Yet the science of the catastrophic effects of global heating and biodiversity loss tells us that there can be no delay in taking action.

COP26 president Alok Sharma describes COVID19 as ‘an unprecedented global challenge’ with the world’s nations ‘rightly focusing their efforts on saving lives’. We were already in the unprecedented global emergency of the climate and ecological crisis, and the focus on saving the lives it threatens should be no less drastic.

With the global response to the COVID pandemic, we have seen that our fundamentally linked-up world is capable of suspending business as usual, of prioritising lives over profit, and of making huge and sudden changes to our societies. We have seen people come together to provide mutual aid and creative responses in the face of overwhelming challenges. And this is what we must do in answer to the global existential threat of climate change.

In the midst of this pandemic, XR Scotland are continuing to act in solidarity, especially with the Global South and Indigenous peoples who are currently dealing with the consequences of climate and ecological emergency in their daily lives – the same people who are now particularly exposed also to the threat of the virus.

Our fight for climate justice and for a sustainable future won’t back down. In these times of crises, let us take care of each other, especially of those most at risk. In this way we will already be creating a more just society.

More information will follow.

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