Climate activist Greta Thunberg won’t go on strike at school after graduation, but vows to continue protesting
Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg said she will no longer be able to skip classes to raise awareness about climate change after graduating high school.
FILE – Climate activist Greta Thunberg arrives at the weekly Fridays for Future demonstration in Mynttorget Square, next to the Riksdagen, the Swedish parliament, on November 11, 2022, in Stockholm, Sweden. Thunberg said on Friday, June 9, 2023, that she will no longer be able to skip classes to raise awareness about climate change because she is now graduating. (Pontus Lundahl/TT news agency via AP, File)
The Associated Press
STOCKHOLM — Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg said on Friday that she can no longer miss classes to raise awareness of climate change because she is graduating.
In 2018, 20-year-old Thunberg started a Friday protest in front of the Swedish parliament building during school hours. Teenagers around the world followed his lead, leading to an international student movement called Fridays for Future.
Since she will no longer be a student, Thunberg noted that her future Friday activities, which “technically” won’t be flashy at school. But in a tweet, he vowed to continue the protest, saying: “The fight has only just begun.”
“We are still moving in the wrong direction where those in power can sacrifice,” Thunberg wrote on Twitter. “We are fast approaching nonlinear ecological and climate tipping points beyond our control.”
As a teenager, Thunberg was invited to address political and business leaders at UN conferences and the annual World Economic Forum in Davos. In 2019, Time magazine named him the youngest person of the year, and he received several nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize.
During the last school strike before parliament, Thunberg posed with a sign in Swedish while wearing the cap typically worn by high school graduates in Sweden.
American singer-songwriter and poet Patti Smith, who performed in Stockholm on Friday as part of a world tour, appeared at the protest and told the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter that she had tears in her eyes when she met Thunberg.
“She’s Greta Thunberg, faithfully taking her Friday school strike for climate change. She’s graduating today, and we’re grateful and congratulating her,” Smith wrote on Instagram.
Thunberg urged the media to focus on other young activists. Fridays for Future participants planned to protest outside the United Nations climate change talks in Bonn, Germany on Friday to call on governments to do more to curb global warming.
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Source: https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/climate-activist-greta-thunberg-school-striking-after-graduation-99957489
