Climate protection and peace

Global warming is one of the greatest challenges of our time. Many countries have already taken important steps to protect the climate, but the urgently needed major breakthrough is not in sight. It is a global problem and can therefore only be solved globally. It requires the international community to work together much more effectively.

But we live in irrational times. Although we actually need to cooperate globally to protect the foundations of our existence, wars and conflicts are clearly on the rise. This makes cooperation between nations extremely difficult. After all, countries that are fighting each other are not suddenly going to work together on environmental protection. To put it simply, the situation could perhaps be described as follows: the house is on fire, but instead of putting out the fire, the firefighters are fighting each other. The issues of peace and climate protection should therefore always be considered together. Large-scale climate protection only has a real chance if we resolve the armed conflicts.

But even in countries not directly involved in combat operations, climate protection is being significantly hampered by the global increase in violence. Wars and conflicts are increasingly becoming the focus of media coverage and public perception. Many people fear an escalation of the conflicts, which is shifting priorities away from issues such as climate protection and towards defence and economic concerns. At the same time, massive increases in spending in many countries are leading to ever-higher levels of government debt, reducing the financial capacity to invest in sustainable climate protection – at the expense of young people and future generations.