Five climate activists from the Fridays for Future movement, including Greta Thunberg, disrupted the general meeting of Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) shareholders in Sweden on Monday.
The activists were allowed to attend the meeting at the company’s headquarters in Frosundavik near Stockholm, since Fridays for Future owned shares in the airline. However, they disrupted the meeting, arguing that the company was creating a false image of environmental sustainability.
Thunberg addressed SAS CEO Anko van der Werff, stating that eco-friendly flights did not exist and asking what SAS could do to reduce the number of flights in the coming years. Van der Werff replied:
“SAS has done a lot to comply with the Paris Agreement and we have acted in such a way as to be in line with the guidelines set out in the agreement. Flying is important. It is important to bring the world together.”
Young people from the movement, including Thunberg, protested on Monday morning before the meeting, claiming the company had no realistic plans to reduce emissions.
Why don’t you respect our future? Why do you only rely on clichés? You don’t listen to us or to the research.
Kevin Anderson, professor of Energy and Climate Change at the University of Manchester, stated that reducing the number of flights was essential. He added that the only realistic option for the sector to contribute to keeping temperature rises below 1.5-2°C was to reduce demand drastically.
Fridays for Future is a youth movement launched in 2018 after 15-year-old Greta Thunberg and other young activists sat in front of the Swedish Parliament in Stockholm every school day for three weeks to protest the lack of action on the climate crisis.
Last week Fridays for Future held a demonstration in front of the Riksdag. Tunberg was then detained by the police.
