16-year-old activist Greta Thunberg blasted world leaders at the UN Climate Summit on Monday. "How dare you?", she asked questioning them for not taking enough steps to prevent climate change.
Thunberg gave an emotional appeal in which she scolded the leaders with her repeated phrase, “How dare you.” She also said that the representatives of different countries are failing young people because of their inaction to address global heating and that "young people are starting to understand" their "betrayal."
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres concluded the summit by listing 77 countries that committed to carbon neutrality by 2050, 70 nations pledging to do more to fight climate change, with 100 business leaders promising to join the green economy and one-third of the global banking sector signing up to green goals.
U.S. President Donald Trump mocked Thunberg on Twitter, writing: “She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!”
- Born on 3 January 2003 in Stockholm, Thunberg is the daughter of opera singer Malena Ernman and actor Svante Thunberg.
- As a child, she was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and selective mutism. She was also depressed and lethargic, stopped talking and eating a few years back. She never considered her autism as an illness but instead, she called it her superpower.
- Greta learnt about climate change at the age of 8 and started an awareness campaign from her own home by asking her parents to lower the family's carbon footprint and adopt a vegan lifestyle. Not only that, her mother had to give up her international career as an opera singer following Greta's insistence to avoid flying as much as possible.
- Later, she started school climate strikes and public speeches due to which she became an internationally recognized climate activist. She used to take time off school to demonstrate outside the Swedish parliament, holding up a sign calling for stronger climate action. With other students engaged in similar protests, she organized a school climate strike movement under the name Fridays for Future.
- Thunberg sailed across the Atlantic Ocean in August 2019 from Plymouth, UK, to New York, US, in a 60 ft racing yacht equipped with solar panels and underwater turbines, which lasted for 15 days.
- In May 2019, she was featured on the cover of Time magazine, which named her a "next-generation leader" and noted that many see her as a role model.
- This is not the first time that Greta had appeared at the international platform. She had also attended the 2018 United Nations Climate Change Conference. After the UN Climate Action Summit in New York City, Greta will also attend the COP 25 Climate Change Conference in Santiago, Chile, which will be held in December.
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