Kumi Naidoo - Executive Director, Greenpeace International HARDtalk

cause to unimaginable terror. For more than 40 years, Greenpeace

has campaigned against environmental degradation. This

month it is mobilising its activists to make a stand on saving

the planet at the UN climate change conference. Is anyone listening to

what they have to say? My Guest is Kumi Naidoo, executive director of

Greenpeace International. Does the organisation need a new vision to

make an impact, and if so, what is Kumi Naidoo, welcome to HARDtalk.

Thank you. Climate change is very much on the back burner. That might

reflect a failure by Greenpeace, doesn't it? Climate change is now

being talked about much more than it ever has. But it is still too

little, too late, to be perfectly honest. We're winning important

battles, but we are losing the war. The reality is, if we follow what

he signs says we are not acting fast enough. Important players are

not getting involved. We need to keep momentum and actually kit

political leaders to recognise that nature does not negotiate. We

cannot change the science, we have to change the politics. When you

say, not winning fast enough and a lot of talk, but no real action,

can I say that it is more extreme than that? The International Energy

Agency has said that climate change is slipping down the agenda. Why is

it happening? When we say we are failing on climate change, who look

we're failing. We are failing our children and Grinch children.

you've except that Greenpeace is responsible for the collective

failure? Absolutely. So long as we have not got an allegiance to

recognise that life on this planet is threatened. We have not been

good enough. Why is Greenpeace failing to make it very loud voice

and high media profile message through? Is the message confused?

Had come from a background of human rights activism. If you are dealing

with poverty, you can take a camera and show homeless people or

children starving to get your understanding immediately. With

human rights, it is the same. You can show pictures of torture. The

difficulties with climate change is that you cannot. Atkins and people

get it. It is an accumulative problem. You cannot show carbon as

a result of burning oil and gas. The enemy that is holding us back,

and the one to use the word enemy quite deliberately, because when

you look at United States they are one of the countries that carries

the biggest responsibility and there is not enough movement. I

jokingly say that the United States is the best democracy that money

can buy. When you look at where the money comes from, for every member

of Congress there are three full- time lobbyists, up to seven. They

are aided by the oil and gas industry. They want to make sure

that no progressive climate legislation is passed. You say the

enemy is the United States? Know, the enemy is the oil and gas

companies. Not only in the US, but in Canada and the parts of the

world. They are beholden to the interests of will and gas. Also,

South Africa. It depends on coal. Absolutely. I want to continue with

Greenpeace and its role and why your message is resonating with

people. But you have been giving it for more than 40 years. You use a

very all-encompassing language. For example, in May this year, you said

that you're winning strategic battles but you are losing the

planet. That is a massive statement. People cannot get their head around

it. Unless people understand the enormity of what we're facing, and

yes it is a big issue, but what we are facing is big. We're talking

about climate change destroying large parts of this planet. Right

now in Africa, we are seeing impact that are taking lives. 400,000

lives being lost every year. It looks like just another ethnic

conflict. Use it when you talk about other rights, it is much

harder because it is more gradual. Are you not responsible for that,

because you are using open statements? Let me develop that

thought. You used very negative language. You said, may be what

will wake us up is that we are talking about a dramatic increase

in catastrophic weather effects. Water shortages, the collapse of

agricultural systems, millions of climate refugees from Africa

heading for Europe. This is happening already. Is that a

responsible statement? All these Africans coming to Europe. Is that

a responsible statement? What is responsible is to speak the truth.

Even when it is not popular. you are trying to scare people.

it is the truth and if people want to be scared by it, then by all

means, get scared by it. We cannot censor the reality of what we're

seeing. When I look at the work we're doing in the Democratic

Republic of the Congo, or what is happening to oceans in West Africa,

where fishing is taking the wealth of the oceans, these are scary

things that are happening. It is not Greenpeace that is saying that

migration is going to happen. makes you think that these tactics,

think about the Fukushima disaster, that did not turn the world of

nuclear power. I can quote to six countries since Fukushima. Italy

has a referendum. Switzerland, the United Arab Emirates, Germany.

look at what they are replacing it with. Take Germany. What are they

replacing it with? Germany today is the first country in the world that

is reaching the point of the majority of its energy coming from

renewable sources. Greenpeace is not saying... But to have countries

in Africa that is building nuclear reactors. Do scaremongering tactics,

that kind of negative message, does it actually work? I do not think it

is scaremongering. We talk about solutions a lot of the time. The

media chooses to pick up on the more high-profile actions that we

take. Most of their work is not what is for trade in the quibble

media. -- portrayed in the global media. We're building alliances

with trade union leaders. We are looking at an alliance. But the

high-profile media campaigns you are renowned for are deliberately

done to catch the eye of the media. And now you are blaming us for

covering that? To be absolutely wanted coverage. We have a solution

called the energy revolution. We're implementing it in different

countries. How countries based on energy efficiencies and serious

investment by 2015, we can wean ourselves of our dependence of

fossil fuels and nuclear. But it is not what penetrates. I think

speaking the truth, saying how serious things were. I am a father.

I am concerned about my daughter and all the children in my life. My

niece and nephews. What is at stake here is absolutely fundamental. It

is more fundamental than every other challenge. That goes back to

what we were saying at the beginning. The message is confusing.

Even if you accept the message on global warming and that we have to

take some action, you have got to fix up the picture. Looking again

at the tactics. You say that we in the media focus on the high profile

campaigns. What happened in August this year when you enter another

campaigner were arrested when you went on an oil rig? You got

arrested. You wanted us to pay attention to that. That was last

year. You had a busy August this year. We have a philosophy from the

early days. If there is an environmental crime that is

happening, we need to get out there, documented, draw global attention

to it. Even if it is committing an illegal act. Absolutely. All

struggles. Mahatma Gandhi was below five and thrown in prison. Nelson

Mandela, Martin Luther King. History teaches us that when

humanity is faced by a terrible injustice or challenge, those

struggles and the move forward. Decent men and women need to stand

up and say enough is enough. There was a court case which Greenpeace

was prevented from joining a protest. But it gives you the right,

as Greenpeace, unelected officials, to do something like that? Several

countries and many corporations were involved and that operation.

What gives you the right to break the law on the behalf of humanity?

As a young activist I got hold this all the time. Who are you, you are

nobody. If they are unjust laws, if there are wars that are now illegal

activity to go on, if there are laws that say environ mental

destruction is OK, we have the moral responsibility that overrides

and all of us who understands what is happening need to do what.

people have been doing it for decades. Absolutely. Slavery was

not illegal. Apartheid was not illegal. But what about Norway. It

is a country that has high human rights abuse and so on. Even it is

involved. Should they not be doing it either? Absolutely. Why is the

Arctic important? I am an African. It is a cold place to go. But the

Arctic is a refrigerator of the world. It regulates the climate.

This year, while we were there, we have hit the lowest level of a

pixie ice. With Hurricane Sandy, it was an additional factor. Not the

only factor. But it melted. Scientists are saying that by the

end of this decade if we do not act now the ice could be completely

gone. We will actually be moved Those countries that are drilling

have a slightly different perspective. The Premier of green

land, who in response to the actions that you too, told the

Financial Times they Greenpeace has succeeded in impeding Greenland's

occupation -- opportunity for securing the future of green land's

people. There is a right for economic development. Even the

communities involved are saying that we accept this kind of

development. It is all right. Why should you think differently?

Greenpeace is committed to sustainable development. I am

committed to eradicating poverty. I believe it can happen in a way that

takes people out of poverty but does not need to put people in

deeper poverty by destroying the environment. Environmental

destruction impacts on poor people much more than it does on rich

people. Rich people can jump in their cars and drive away. But the

point that I am trying to make, as executive director of Greenpeace

International, is that the shock tactics which are embodied in your

emission statement. -- mission statement, civil disobedience, are

not illegal acts. These tactics that they use deny you a place

inside the tent, a way you can be engaging with governments, with

corporations, and trying to influence the debate from within,

rather than being a rebel voice. The reality is that anybody,

anywhere on the streets of any country, you ask them what speeds

the loudest, and they will say that actions have -- speaks louder than

words. We have been talking and talking and negotiating. We are

inside all those forums. What about the one in France that is going to

talk about energy transition. Greenpeace says they are not going

to be involved. The Institute for sustainable development are going

to be sitting inside these talks. But Greenpeace say that it is

against their principles. We make an assessment about where but there

is going to be a lot of talk and nothing is going to come out of it

because of the make up. You do not know that. The irony is, the civil

disobedience were, is not even 15% of what we do. Most of what we do

is being in those negotiations. Look at the British Government.

Greenpeace UK has been in the news because it had an undercover

reporter talking to senior Conservatives, it does not see eye

to eye with its Liberal Democrat partners in the government, and the

idea was to try and name and shame the Chancellor of the Exchequer,

George Osborne, into showing that he has gone soft in Greenpeace

because it is too expensive. That is a clear example of how

Greenpeace is trying to name and shame. It is not a monopoly of

Greenpeace. Political leaders promise certain things in the

election and they do not deliver. It is our responsibility as

citizens to hold them to account and to expose them for lying and

not following the truth. Especially when they are dragging their feet,

and we have one-to-one meetings with various governments, I can

quote you with any number of heads of state that I have met this year,

and we have one-to-one meetings, they agree with us 100% that time

is running out, the situation is serious and so on, but once we

walked out, what we have, business as usual. You have not done

anything in this investigate undercover mission that tells us

anything that we did not know about the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He

has reaffirmed his commitment to the Government's autumn -- energy

promise. He said that we should not prize British business out of the

world economy. We will not be able to achieve those goals, businesses

will fail and our country will be poorer. It is blatantly wrong. He

is wrong in his overall assessment and we have to call him out. Looked

at how governments have responded to the financial crisis. They have

tried to put one Band Aid over another band aid. What is needed is

to bring the challenges of the economy, Equity, poverty and

ecology together. We cannot continue to treat them as if they

are different. You look at all the opinion polls. Francois Hollande

made a statement after six months and says that his priority is

growth and creating jobs. In the presidential election, climate

change hardly featured. It is not even in the top ten. The

politicians are reflecting what the people who elected them believed.

The politicians in most of the dominant countries reflect what

people are telling them, they reflect of the interests of the

most powerful sectors of society, banks, oil, and coal companies.

They are not reflecting the interests of ordinary people. The

reality is the job creation potential of moving to a green

economic future is significant. When we sat down with Angela Merkel,

and we made the arguments, trillions of euros of taxpayers'

money that goes into nucleic only generates 30,000 jobs. -- into

nuclear energy. In every country around the world, we can have a

double. We can have a win for jobs and a win for the Environment, if

our governments invested now. is the money coming from? Look at

the global fund that was set up in Copenhagen. It was supposed to have

$100 billion every year to help the developing world tried to combat

global warming. Not a penny in the pond. That is why you are failing,

there is not the money. Let me do the two are examples. In Doha, we

expect movement on the growing climate fund. It is pathetic that

the resources are not available. This was supposed to be fast-track

funding. It has been going on for years. Secondly, we want another

cure turf. We hope that the US dynamic will shift. President Obama,

sadly, for the first time in his acceptance speech, he said we have

to act against the warming planet, and we hope that they will come

from a slightly different position, and a recognition that we would I

get into the tipping Bight. The time mind that we are on right now,

if we get a binding treaty in 2020, that is too late. You want to

recruit to the Pope to your cause. Not specifically the Pope, but

every religion in the world, if you pick up the Bible or the Koran,

there are gems of environmental wisdom. I think our religious

leaders have been deafening in their silence by not standing up as

strongly as they should, to speak for the Environment, which is also

got's creation, and to talk about climate change. More and more of

them are getting involved, but I appeal to them to get more actively

involved. I know as executive director you fly all over the world,

but your headquarters are in Amsterdam. The Netherlands is a

nation of cyclists. What about your own green credentials? I am on my

bicycle and on foot quite a lot. The important thing is the struggle

for justice, whether it is environmentally justice, social

justice, the struggles are not popularity contest. Those who

choose to stand up and push for the struggles have to accept that you

are going to be unpopular because you are going to say things that

are unpopular and which suggest transformational change is

necessary. Whether in Amsterdam or in Africa, the time has come for a