Climate change activist supports students missing school for strikes

Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, an 18-year old activist from Colorado, urged university students to walk out of lectures and strike about climate change, as school pupils across the United States have done.

He is one of 21 young people who are suing the the Trump administration for lack of action in tackling climate change.

US President Donald Trump has previously said that global warming is a hoax to attack US manufacturing, and withdrew the country from the Paris climate agreement.

Martinez, global youth director of conservation organisation Earth Guardians, has been campaigning for environmental justice since he was six-years-old.

He suggests that his generation “thinks differently” and has a “greater understanding of technology because [they] grew up with it.”

“I see this movement is more global, more connected, more diverse, younger, and more intergenerational than ever before,” he told The Guardian.

“We’re one of the last generations that will have the chance to lead the way on this.”

We’re one of the last generations that will have the chance to lead the way on this

– Xiuhtezcatl Martinez

He says that students should push universities to rid themselves of fossil fuels and support the strikes: “Now university students have to step up too. Not everyone is outspoken, but we all have a significant part to play.”

The activist supports and stands by Greta Thunberg, the Swedish 16-year-old who initiated the recent student strikes when she refused to go to school last August.

He told The Guardian: “It would be pretty cool if uni students walk out in solidarity with Greta.”

On 15 February, the UK’s first nationwide schools’ strike took place as part of the global School Strike 4 Climate, in which children of all ages were invited to take part in the demonstrations.

Evie Baldwin, a 15-year-old student from north London, explained to The Guardian her reason for taking part in the strike: “As students we don’t have the vote, and it is really unfair because this is going to impact on us the most. It is our future.”

In recent months, 20,000 children and students across Germany, Belgium, Switzerland and Australia have missed school to challenge climate change initiatives by governments