In the Netherlands, police arrested six climate activists in their homes Thursday and charged them with incitement over their roles in planning nonviolent civil disobedience actions.
Their arrests came ahead of Saturday’s planned peaceful blockade of a highway next to the Dutch Parliament in The Hague. The group Extinction Rebellion is demanding an immediate end to $19 billion in annual fossil fuel subsidies.
In more climate news, over 450 environmental and human rights groups have condemned the appointment of an oil company executive to lead the COP28 U.N. climate summit in the United Arab Emirates later this year.
Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber heads the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company. Members of the Kick Big Polluters Out network wrote in an open letter to top U.N. officials: “There is no honor in appointing a fossil fuel executive who profits immensely off of fueling the climate crisis to oversee the global response to climate change. That such a move could ever be seen to be legitimate amidst an intensifying climate crisis where millions of lives and ecosystems are on the line exemplifies just how insidious Big Polluters’ stranglehold over climate policy is.”
