arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)

I want to welcome thousands of Friends here today, to build our dyke, the most dramatic action to be taken at the Hague climate talks.
This is a very special occasion. It is the largest international protest ever staged by the Friends of the Earth network. Thousands of people are here todaym from more than forty countries. We are here as ordinary peoplem and as campaigners on behalf o millions who have suffered the terrible effects of climate change.

In El Salvador, we have seen the devastation of Hurricane Mitch, worst hurricane in the history of Latin America. Thousands of people died. Tens of thousands of houses were destroyed. Even friends of the Earth's own people were touched by tragedy with death of one of our staff members.

Other FOE members from around the world are here and can speak of their own experiences of weather disasters. My friend Michael from Nigeria for example whose family's harvest was destroyed in recent drought.

We are here today to speak for those who cannot come to speak for themselves. We are hear to bear witness to the world's politicians as they meet and talk endlessly in their air-conditioned bubble. We are here as the people who elected them, to hold them to account for their actions in the Hague.

Three years ago in Kyoto, these same politicians took a solemn promise to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
They promised to begin to reverse the human actions that have led to dangerous climate change.

It was only a small step. The Kyoto deal -at its very best - would only have stopped things from getting any worse. But even this small step seems to be beyond many of our politicians, too big an effort for them to make.

So we have seen the rich countries of the North try every trick they know to avoid changing their ways. We have seen them try to enlarge every loophole, quibble over every clause, and search for every excuse. The rich countries created climate change. They pollute the most. But it is the poor countries of the South who pay the highest price. Why should one country have the right to destroy the planet for others?

Developing countries do not have the resources to avoid the worst effects of climate change. The demand justice and equity at these talks. The rich countries must do most, because the have done the most damage. And the politicians of the North must see off the fossil fuel lobbyists of the Global Climate Coalition who glide smoothly around these talks trying to wreck them in the scrabble for ever greater profits.

Everyone from the Netherlands will know this already. But our friends from other countries may not know that the Hague Conference Centre is already below sea level.
The Dutch people have built and maintained dykes for years keep their country safe from the sea. Recently, they have had to build them even higher as sea levels begin to rise again.

Today we build a dyke as an act of solidarity. We do it to remind the world that the pric of climate change is too high for the world to pay. We do it to provide a symbol of the need for action. Future generations deserve an economy that is truly sustainable.
They deserve a future based on renewable energy, not on the grim legacy of dependence on fossil fuels.

One day, our children ask us what did in the battle against climate change. We can say, among other things,
that we came to the Hague to bear witness and to build a dyke. We will turn the tide.

The politicians inside must listen to the people outside who elected them. They must reach a fair and radical deal. A deal that truly cuts greenhouse gas emissions and is just to the countries of the South as well as the North. Then they will be able to look their own children in the face and say that they lived up to their duty in the Hague.

Ricarco Navarro