Solidarity for Justice Award honours
Palestine
Climate justice movements call for
protection, accountability and unrestricted humanitarian
access as winter floods threaten displaced families in
Gaza
Climate justice movements at COP31 are honouring
the people of Palestine with the Solidarity for Justice
Award, recognising their resilience in the face of
continuing violence, displacement and violations of human
rights.
The award comes amid renewed attacks on Gaza,
including an Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital in Khan
Younis on Thursday that killed at least six people,
including a surgeon, and wounded more than 20
others.
Heavy rains have flooded an estimated 70,000
tents sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza, leaving
families exposed to worsening winter conditions while
restrictions on humanitarian aid hamper relief efforts. The
UN has warned that restrictions on humanitarian access,
delays and funding shortages are leaving Palestinians
exposed to preventable suffering as winter
approaches.
In the occupied West Bank, Palestinians
continue to face military operations, settler violence and
displacement. An October report by a UN Commission of
Inquiry found that Israel had committed war crimes and
crimes against humanity in the Occupied Palestinian
Territory, and that genocidal acts continued in Gaza despite
the ceasefire agreement.
Nominated by CAN Arab World
and CAN Africa, the award is a recognition of Palestinian
resilience and an urgent call for the protection of
civilians, accountability for violations of international
law and immediate, unrestricted humanitarian
access.
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The climate justice movement stands in
solidarity with Palestinians defending their lives, homes,
land, heritage and livelihoods.
No climate
justice without a free
Palestine.
Fossil of the Day to
Russia
From challenging climate science to
jailing Indigenous climate defenders, Russia is undermining
climate justice at home and abroad.
Today’s Fossil
of the Day goes to Russia for obstructing climate
negotiations, clinging to fossil fuels and persecuting
Indigenous climate defenders. Russia came to Antalya with a
simple plan: less science, more fossil fuels. Earlier this
week, it joined calls to delete references to scientific
estimates of global temperature rise and to weaken language
on exceeding 1.5°C. It also continues to count occupied
Ukrainian territory in its UN climate reporting, as if
invasion came with carbon accounting rights.
Why would
a country work so hard to slow down climate action? Russia
has a trillion answers.
Viktoriya Ball,
Secretariat representative of CAN Eastern Europe, Caucasus
and Central Asia (CAN EECCA), said: “Since the
full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, it has
earned more than €1 trillion from fossil fuel exports.
That’s a trillion reasons to keep the oil and gas flowing,
and every one of them helps pay for the
war.”
Russia’s long-term energy strategy
expands coal and gas production. It ranks third from bottom
in the Climate Change Performance Index, ahead of only the
United States and Iran. It isn’t the gold medal, but
Russia is clearly trying hard.
The war has generated
an estimated 311 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions
in four years, comparable to France’s annual emissions,
with climate damage estimated at more than US$57 billion.
And it’s set to get even worse: next year, Russia’s
draft budget raises military spending to about US $203
billion, 27% more than previously planned. Apparently, money
is easier to find for war than climate action.
And
while Russia’s delegation negotiates in Antalya, one of
the Indigenous leaders who should be here is in a Moscow
jail. In December 2025, weeks after returning from COP30,
Daria Egereva, a Selkup climate advocate and co-chair of the
International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change,
was detained with human rights defender Natalia Leongardt in
a wave of raids on Indigenous activists. Both women remain
in pre-trial detention on terrorism charges carrying up to
20 years in prison. From her cell, Egereva has written to
her colleagues at COP31:“My voice is our collective
voice – that is being put on trial within the UN
arena.”
Participation in UN climate negotiations
is not a crime. Defending Indigenous rights is not
terrorism.
CAN calls on Russia to pay for the climate
damage caused by its war, stop obstructing international
climate action and free Daria Egereva and Natalia
Leongardt.
Free Indigenous voices. End
Russia’s occupation of
Ukraine.
