Joint Opening Intervention. COP, CMP, CMA, SBSTA and SBI
COP25, Madrid

Thank you Chair, my name is Antonia Zambra, from Chile, and I speak on behalf of the Women and Gender Constituency. We come today in solidarity with feministas who are with allies, hosting the Cumbre de los Pueblos.

Women and feminists have been on the frontlines of the protests in Chile, as they are on the frontlines of the climate justice movement. The unclear circumstances around the death of Macarena Valdés, a woman environmental defender, emphasizes the important need for the Chilean government to sign and ratify the Escazú’s Agreement.  We are calling on Chile to end the economic, political and sexual violence towards women, girls and gender non-conforming people. We must protect the right to freedom of assembly.

The social revolution in Chile mirrors the demands and mobilizations of social, economic and ecological justice and feminist movements around the world.

We are challenging the very conditions which we know are fundamental drivers of the climate crisis – systems that prioritize profit over people and elites over majority, that privatize critical public goods, and uphold a model of resource extraction, environmental exploitation and militarization.

We need urgent climate action that ensures a rights-based and people-centered global framework that works towards a just transition for all. We urge you to deliver upscaled, ambitious, fast-tracked and gender-transformative finance to ensure climate frontline communities, the poorest countries and people are able to better respond and adapt to the urgent and slow-onset realities of the climate crisis, as well as to address irrevocable loss and damage.

Here in Madrid we will continue to hold you accountable for this climate emergency and remind you that Feminists want system change.