Nov. 7, 2022
Contact: Olivia@climatejusticealliance.org, 301-613-4767

US Delegation of Frontline Activists Demand Community Solutions, Reparations and Human Rights Be Central to Global Climate Commitments at COP27

Washington, D.C. — More than 60 frontline leaders from six North American-based climate justice organizations are heading to Egypt for COP27 November 4, as a part of the “It Takes Roots Alliance” delegation. This delegation includes the Climate Justice Alliance, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, Indigenous Environmental Network, Indigenous Climate Action, Just Transition Alliance and The Black Hive at Movement for Black Lives. The delegation aims to ensure the solutions of those most impacted in the U.S. are heard and that our governments take responsibility for their role in our current climate emergency at home and in the Global South. In part, this can be done by adhering to binding climate agreements and not obstructing the process in allegiance to a dying fossil fuel industry.

Delegates available to speak with reporters include:

Tom Gooldtooth, Executive Director, Indigenous Environmental Network (Climate Finance / Climate Reparations)

Eriel Tchekwie Deranger, Executive Director, Indigenous Climate Action (Human Rights and Rights of Indigenous Peoples)

Ozawa Bineshi Albert, Co-Executive Director, Climate Justice Alliance (False Solutions)

José Bravo, Executive Director, Just Transition Alliance (False Solutions)

Reverend Michael Malcom, Executive Director, Alabama Interfaith Power and Light, representing Black Hive at Movement for Black Lives (Climate Reparations, Loss and Damage)

Siwatu Salama-Ra, Demilitarization Organizer Detroit, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (Human Rights, Climate Reparations)

Lookbook of frontline delegates during COP27 HERE.

For 27 years, the United Nations has brought governments, academics, scientists and corporations together to address climate change with little success in actually halting the climate crisis or guaranteeing that the largest polluters actually abide by global agreements. Every year, frontline communities have been present, demanding that significant and binding climate agreements based on science and the wisdom of Indigenous communities around the world be passed and adhered to. The delegates continue to intervene against false “solutions,” including pollution trading, offset, bioenergy and geoengineering in the implementation of the Paris Agreement, schemes that only further accelerate the climate crisis.

This year, community leaders and environmental justice experts will be on the ground in Egypt to demand that COP27, which is already being coined the climate finance COP, will actually address climate reparations as a solution that begins to solve the loss and damage frontline communities and Global South nation-states face around the globe.

Specifically, these environmental justice leaders are calling on their governments to make a firm commitment to: 

• Climate reparations and compensation for past harms that have caused irreversible impacts to natural environments, Man-made infrastructure, Economic systems, and people, around the world,

These funds can support community-led solutions that leave no one behind rather than false ones and must be at the core of projects that actually mitigate and end harmful practices propped up by big-industry looking to make a buck rather than actually solving the climate crisis. Market-based mechanisms and techno-fixes such as carbon capture and storage and risky geoengineering experiments that are unproven to actually work are not viable pathways forward to actually stopping future extreme weather events, climate displacement, and climate change in general. 

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Climate Justice Alliance is a member-led organization of over 80 urban and rural frontline communities, organizations and support networks in the climate justice movement. We work to build real solutions to the climate crisis through building local, living, regenerative economies while pushing back against false promises from corporate controlled interests.