Speech from M. Kofi Annan - summit of conscience - cese

From a meeting in Paris for a “Summit of Conscience for Climate”, initiated by Nicolas Hulot, the French President’s Special Envoy for the protection of the planet, we are taking this opportunity to speak to you, person to person. By their nature, COPs offer an opportunity to meet and talk at the highest level. They also offer an opportunity to undertake decisive steps to tackle climate change; but as we all know that opportunity is beset by challenges. 2015 is a dramatic year for making key choices for Humanity: we need to reinvent how we tackle the major challenges that face us and our planet. This calls for new ways of living and acting. Such a call comes from the deep belief by the signatories to this letter that to really make a difference each of us needs to approach these complex challenges from our own individual personal consciences. This calls for real honesty at every level, and it is vital that it starts here, among those deeply involved at the level of leaders of national delegations, NGOs, the scientific community, civil society… So as you prepare to come to Paris we would like to ask you to think about your personal role, and answer a simple, but profound, question: Why do I care? Your response might be very personal – the influence of a parent, child or grandparent; the influence of culture or personal beliefs; the influence of a transformative experience of the wonder and beauty of nature; a crisis in your life which brought you back to core values. In our contemporary world it is very rare that we are asked to talk about what lies at the heart of our actions. Instead we hide behind statistics, data, policy statements etc, few of which actually touch other people’s hearts and minds. To create this letter, and to consolidate the movement behind asking this question, several public and private institutions hosted The Summit of Conscience, in Paris, July 2015. They invited thinkers, faith leaders, artists, cultural figures, thinkers and others to explore the idea of individual conscience as a way to finding a real solution to climate change and the destruction of the environment. Many of the Summit attendees are signatories to this letter, and each has gone through the thoughtful, sometimes tough, often revealing process of trying to find an honest answer, rather than just an obvious one. In telling the story of Why do I care, you will be joining millions around the world, including the example set recently by His Holiness The Pope, in making climate change and the protection of our beautiful planet a personal issue of our own beliefs and values. Why are we asking you to do this? Because we hope that in answering this question, you will come to the Cop primarily as a conscious human being not just a representative of a Government or agency. In the end the most important element of this is that we hear from you as a person, a member of the human family who has for a time a uniquely significant role to play in protecting the world. Introductory Session Speech from M. Kofi Annan, Chair of “the Elders”, Chairman of the “Kofi Annan Foundation”, Former Secretary-General of the United Nations