On Capitol Hill, Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg pleaded with a congressional committee Wednesday to listen to climate scientists’ warnings about catastrophic climate change. In a short opening statement, the 16-year-old youth climate leader said she was not submitting a testimony and would instead enter a report by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change into the Congressional Record. The report calls on world leaders to take rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented action to avert a climate catastrophe.
Greta Thunberg: “I am submitting this report as my testimony because I don’t want you to listen to me, I want you to listen to the scientists, and I want you to unite behind the science. And then I want you to take real action.”
More than a million students are expected to walk out of classes in over 150 countries on Friday in a Global Climate Strike, with more than 800 actions in the United States alone. Youth leaders are also billing Friday’s strike as a day of action for Puerto Rico. September 20 marks the second anniversary of Hurricane Maria’s landfall on the island, which led to thousands of deaths, destroying homes and businesses and knocking out electricity for months. We’ll have more on the climate crisis after headlines with Kumi Naidoo, Amnesty International’s secretary general.