Just before noon on Tuesday March 1, follow a morning of intermittent air-raid sirens, a tweetLive from an account geotagged at Independence Square in Kyiv (Ukraine) “We are scared,” its author wrote. “We need you to be there for us.”
The tweet was posted to the account Ukraine’s chapterThis is Fridays for Future — the youth activist group named after Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg’s now-iconic weekly protest — ricocheted quickly around online climate communities.
“We are youth climate activists usually fighting a crisis we didn’t cause, now finding ourselves at the front lines of a war we didn’t start,” the thread continued. “We ask for all of our brothers and sisters from Fridays for Future to go on the streets, to demand this war to end, to fight for peace in our name.”
Within hours, young people all over the world rallied in full force and are now planning targeted actions to mark Thursday, March 3, one week after Russian troops invaded Ukraine. Youth-led protests have been planned. nearly 60According to organizers, cities include Lagos, Nigeria; Lisbon Portugal; and Las Vegas Nevada.
“We’re seeing that climate justice and the call for peace has never been more intertwined than now, as we’re seeing a war being fought funded by fossil fuel exports taking people’s lives away,” Luisa Neubauer, 25, lead organizer with Fridays for Future Germany, told Truthout. “So for us, we know that there will be no real freedom or sustainable peace anywhere as long as there’s dependency on fossil fuels, and at the same time we need emergency help for Ukrainians,” she said.
Organizers are calling on school districts to let students join midday protests on Thursday, which officials have authorized for the first time in Neubauer’s hometown of Hamburg, Germany. The Fridays for Future network has also launched a protest-planning initiative for youth climate activists. websiteThis was modeled after the one they used during the 2018-2019 youth climate activism surge to map and rally support. “We know how to do it,” Neubauer said.
Worldwide dependence on Russian oil and gas — the backboneRussian economy, comprising over 60 percent of Russian exports in 2019 — is one reason why Russian President Vladimir Putin could launch this attack without fearing stronger pushback from other world leaders.
Meanwhile youth activists are quick to point out that goals related to Russia’s fossil fuel exports and control of pipeline routes have driven previous military ventures directed by Putin, including Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008, its support for dictator Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria in 2011and the annexation Crimea in March 2014.
The Fridays for Future Ukraine’s call to action was not the only antiwar rallying cry in the youth climate community. “We believe that the threat of global war, which can potentially become nuclear, can be diverted if Gazprom, Rosneft and all oil and gas companies that actively cooperate with Putin’s regime, are immediately deprived of financial resources and political influence,” youth activists with Ukraine’s chapter of Extinction Rebellion (XR), another leading international climate activist organization, wrote in a separate emergency call to action. The group characterized Putin’s regime as aiding “in the project of planetary destruction and war against people and nature.” Russia is the third-largest contributorTo reduce greenhouse gas emissions worldwide.
“We are calling for blocking, picketing and climbing over the offices of oil and gas companies of the Russian Federation and all their business partners in the EU, UK and worldwide,” the call saidThe document identifies Gazprom and Rosneft as priority sites of protest, along with Transneft (Surgutneftegas) and LukOil (LukOil).
Youth activists were not available as of the writing of this article. TruthoutReached out for comment, they did not confirm the actions taken in response to XR Ukraine. This could be due to the rise in laws that criminalize protest that occurs within a certain distance of energy infrastructure or that could “hinder business.”
According to reports, the European Union by The New York Times, relies on Russia for more than 25 percent of its oil and 40 percent of its gas, is well-positioned to accelerate plans to build fleets of renewables, young people say — if they can tap into ample political will.
Leading climate experts agree. “Imagine a Europe that ran on solar and wind power: whose cars ran on locally provided electricity, and whose homes were heated by electric air-source heat pumps. That Europe would not be funding Putin’s Russia, and it would be far less scared of Putin’s Russia,” 350.org founder Bill McKibben wrote for The Guardian. “We can do it fast if we want: huge offshore wind farms in Europe have been built inside of 18 months without any wartime pressure.”
Climate scientists and diplomats have similarly reiterated perspectives in line with activists’ calls for building massive renewable energy capacityAs a conflict intervention. “Heat pumps for peace!” tweetedLeah Stokes, University of California Santa Barbara climate and energy professor, refers to fossil fuel-free alternativeto heat and cool buildings. Stokes’s comment was in direct response to United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres’s post calling for even more rapid decarbonization in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, on the heels of the latest, extremely dire, but still hopeful, comprehensive Climate report.
Youth climate activists — who research shows have particular sway over changing opinions on climate of their conservative parents — are in a unique position to heighten awareness of the links between the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and societal dependence on fossil fuels. Their potential to reach large audiences is also immense: The youth climate movement grew in force in the years immediately preceding the pandemic. Many youth climate activist groups have digital media followings that rival established news organizations in terms of size. According to the organization’s own granular statisticsSince November 2019, Fridays for Future has attracted hundreds of millions of people to its protests.
Young people are also asking their elders to not get distracted by the conflict and work to reduce the climate crisis. “It’s not disrespectful for us to keep working and keep advocating for the climate during this crisis,” 16-year-old youth climate activist and founder of Earth Uprising, Alexandria Villaseñor, said on Twitter. “Actually, it’s imperative. Researchers and scholars have shown us that events such as these and climate collapse are connected. Our work is not a distraction, it’s part of the solution.”
Many activists — particularly those in Russia — are taking on Serious riskParticipate in the protests. Arshak Makichyan (27), a member Fridays for Future Russia was recently detained ahead of an action and is currently awaiting trial for a series of arbitrary charges. Makichyan said Truthout that engaging in activism in Russia is “almost unbearable,” adding that activists are being expelled from university and work, surveilled and blackmailed, and their families are being harassed.
“We are risking our freedom and lives in Russia, people in Ukraine are dying, so world leaders should do something,” Makichyan said. “Everyone should do something.”
Neubauer, the German climate activist, wonders if youth climate activist concerns — which have always been about international peace and well-being — will now, finally, be taken seriously. “For years we have been smiled at when we demand renewables, which are not only the cheapest and greenest energies, but also the most peaceful,” Neubauer posted on TwitterFrom a Berlin protest on February 27, 2009. “Autocrats don’t stop being autocrats, the answer to war must be a radical exit from coal, oil and gas.”
