New Delhi: 10 years old Indian Climate Activist Licypriya Kangujam left for New York yesterday to attend the high level events of the UN Transforming Education Summit during the 77th Session of the United Nations General Assembly on the invitation of the UN Secretary General. She is representing India and the voice of millions of children of the world.
Every September, world leaders from United Nations member states gather at the UN Headquarters, New York to debate the most important issues facing the world.
UNGA77 opens on Tuesday 13 September, with the first day of the high level General Debate on Tuesday 20 September.
The theme of this year is: “A watershed moment: transformative solutions to interlocking challenges,” to reflect the many connected issues we face today including war in Ukraine, the energy and cost –of-living crisis, the COVID19 pandemic and humanitarian disasters caused by climate change. All of these are on the agendas.
Licypriya is a student of Grade 5 at Ryan International School and recently appointed as the new special envoy of the President of Timor Leste (East Timor). She is accompanied by her mother.
She addressed the media that, “Island Countries like Timor Leste are responsible for less than 0.0% of the global carbon emissions but they are the biggest victim of the global climate crisis. Many villages are now sinking due to rising sea levels. We deserve climate justice and the rich countries must pay for the loss and damage to the developing countries. There will be no climate justice without climate finance”.
“And instead of spending billions of dollars in wars, if we spend it on fighting climate change, ending poverty and giving education then what a wonderful place this earth would be!”, she added.
Licypriya thanked the United States Embassy in New Delhi for issuing her visa in a record time of one day to attend the general assembly and also initially she was likely to cancel the event due to expiry of her passport validity. Later the Ministry of External Affairs intervened and issued her new passport within a few days.
She highlighted that India is facing lots of environmental issues like floods, droughts, heat waves, cyclones, locusts, air pollution, etc at the same time. These are all the impacts of climate change. Thousands of innocent children lost their lives and their parents due to high air pollution levels and climate crisis. And millions of people are becoming homeless.
In one of the media questions, she replied that, “I am going there to seek climate justice. We don’t know how to fix the forests now transformed into deserts. We don’t know how to fix the rivers and lakes now dry and dead. We don’t know how to fix the habitats of countless voiceless animals now used for mining. If we don’t know how to fix it then please stop breaking it”.
“Sacrificing the lives of millions of children for the failures of our leaders is unacceptable at any cost. We want clean air to breathe, clean water to drink and clean planet to live. Climate change is not only for me or for you or for someone else. Climate change problem is for every single person living in this world. Each and every child living in this country, living in this world is already the victim of climate change”, she lamented.
Licypriya is one of the leading voices for climate change in the world. She is one of the youngest participants in this year’s general assembly. She will be returning back on 26th September to India after meeting several world leaders.
