IN PICTURES: Latin America’s biggest ever climate march

Published on 10/12/2014, 9:27pm

As negotiators work towards a global climate deal at UN talks in Lima, some 20,000 people demanded action

(Pic: 350/Jamie Henn)

As negotiators entered day 9 of UN climate talks in Lima, out on the streets an estimated 20,000 marched to demand action.

Inside the temporary diplomatic village created in the grounds of a military base, the pace of progress was slow.

Outside, the message was of urgency. “Climate crisis! Time to act is now,” said a placard of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance.

“There are no jobs on a dead planet,” read a trade union banner. “Resistancia,” said another.

Friends of the Earth International campaigner Dipti Bhatnagar said a global climate deal must protect people on the front line.

“The movement to end the fossil fuel age that has been based on ceaseless extraction, pollution and dispossession of local communities is only growing stronger. Workers, indigenous peoples, women, youth and environmental activists are linking together to forge new societies and energy systems that put people and the planet first, over corporate greed.” Bhatnagar said.

“If the UN process does nothing to speed that transition, if it does nothing to drastically change our climate course in the immediate pre-2020 period then it will be deliberately ignoring the will of the people taking to the streets.”

(Pic: 350/Jamie Henn)