Ugandan climate change activist Vanessa Nakate has told Sky News the UK will be “failing the planet” if it continues to invest in new fossil fuels.
Ms Nakate said Britain should not be expanding drilling in the North Sea, lifting the ban on fracking for shale gas or considering opening a new coal mine in Cumbria.
“Climate leadership is not calling oneself ‘a leader’, it is real action,” she said.
“If the UK continues to open new coal, oil and gas infrastructure, then the UK is not a climate leader, it is failing not only the people, it’s failing the planet as well.
“It is failing future generations, it is failing present generations that are seeing the impact of the climate crisis right now.”
Her comments come just weeks before the UK hands over its presidency of the COP UN climate change summit to Egypt.
She said she had little time for the argument that the energy crisis has necessarily turned countries back to fossil fuels.
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“It always goes back to the interests of the West,” she said.
“What sympathy should we have with the West because the energy prices are going high?… What happens to the citizens in Uganda, whose energy prices are also going up?
“Why don’t we change the conversation to, you know, ‘what does the Global South need?’
“You know, people, millions of people in Africa, still don’t have access to electricity, and when you think about the rising energy prices, it’s only going to get worse.
“That’s why we need renewable energy, no more fossil fuel infrastructure.”
‘Fight for a starving child instead of art’
Ms Nakate argued the criticism directed at the controversial Just Stop Oil group, which has recently targeted art and cultural destinations, was misplaced.
She said: “It’s really a place of privilege to be disturbed because something has been done to art.
“For me, if I’m to choose fighting for art, or fighting for a child who’s starving, I will fight for a child who is starving.
“If just the thought of an art piece being destroyed can cause all this tension and all this criticism, how I wish the thought of a child starving would cause the same reaction and get people to speak up and get people to do something about the climate crisis.”
There are growing calls for the rich nations most responsible for climate change to create a new funding facility to compensate those least responsible and most vulnerable to the crisis.
It is referred to as loss and damage, and for Ms Nakate it will be a defining issue at the COP27 UN climate summit in Egypt.
She said: “The climate crisis is pushing people beyond adaptation.
“People are losing things that they can’t get back, you can’t adapt to the loss of your culture or your traditions, and I think this is what the climate crisis is causing right now.
“In the end, histories are being destroyed.”
