UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for greater accountability from major climate polluters, urging governments to ensure that those responsible for the largest share of emissions contribute more to addressing climate damage.
In what campaigners described as his final UN climate address, Guterres reaffirmed the importance of keeping the 1.5°C temperature goal alive and said, “Polluters must pay.”
His remarks came a day after the Make Polluters Pay International coalition presented petitions carrying more than two million signatures to the United Nations, calling on governments to make fossil-fuel companies contribute to the costs of climate damage.
The coalition, including 350.org, Greenpeace International, Fossil Free Media and Oxfam International, is calling for measures such as climate-damage taxes, permanent surtaxes on fossil-fuel profits and fines, with revenues directed toward adaptation, recovery, loss and damage and a just transition to renewable energy.
