Thunberg and UN meet with Ukrainian environmental organizations in Kyiv
Photo: President's Office
On Thursday, July 29, in the Ukrainian capital, Greta Thunberg and the UN secretly met with representatives of Ukrainian environmental organizations.
Rubryka reports this.
"We need acquaintances, we need people, we need money to help us" – this is how the representative of the UN briefly explained the main purpose of the meeting, which took place in the President's Office.
The meeting took place immediately after Greta's official press conference.
The event was held to introduce Ukrainian public organizations engaged in environmental protection activities to UNEP representatives.
It is a UN program focused on climate, nature, environmental pollution, sustainable development, and other topics related to creating and maintaining a safe environment.
At the closed discussion, UNEP stated they had certain plans and ideas. According to the UN representative, to implement them in Ukraine, the organization "needs acquaintances, needs people, needs money to help us."
Even though earlier, Greta Thunberg assessed the efforts of the UN to overcome the consequences of the ecological disaster in the Kherson region as insufficient and laughed at this issue, she was also present at the meeting.
The activist said that Ukrainians must understand exactly how they will later work with the damage caused by Russia to the environment.
Representatives of Ukrainian environmental protection organizations, in particular, UAnimals, Greenpeace Ukraine, All-Ukrainian Environmental League, UECG (Ukrainian Environmental Protection Group), and Environment People Law, spoke about the main areas of activity during the war, the challenges they had to deal with, prospects and plans.
For example, Oleksiy Vasyliuk from the Ukrainian Nature Protection Group mentioned the problem of reducing biodiversity due to military actions on the territory of Ukraine, the loss of valuable species of plants and animals, the risks of populating territories damaged by military actions, spreading of invasive non-native plant species.
Tetiana Tymochko, head of the All-Ukrainian Ecological League, told how the disaster after the explosion of the Kakhovka Reservoir dam could affect global food security. She predicted that some African countries could be threatened with famine since the main grain supplies came from Ukraine.
Other issues were also raised: the panelists talked about the challenges they faced during the year and a half of the war. They also mentioned that in the future, Ukrainian institutions and local public organizations would be involved in creating a system for compensation for damages caused by Russian ecocide.
In connection with future plans for creating an International Group whose task is to create a mechanism for compensation for environmental damage, the meeting may probably be related to selecting organizations that will participate in the program. However, this is still unknown.
Oleksiy Vasyliuk, head of the Ukrainian Environmental Protection Group, told Rubryka that the discussion participants were not yet offered to join the group.
Photo: President's Office
For reference:
It should be noted that on June 29, eco-activist Greta Thunberg came to Kyiv; she will join the International Working Group on Environmental Crimes of Russia.
