Johnson warns of 'doomsday' as climate summit begins

The 26th Conference of Parties (COP-26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change began in Glasgow on Monday.British Prime Minister Boris Johnson opened a global climate summit. In his opening address, Johnson said  the world is strapped to a “doomsday device.” Johnson likened an ever-warming Earth’s position to that of fictional secret agent James Bond — strapped to a bomb that will destroy the planet and trying to work out how to defuse it..He told leaders that “we are in roughly the same position” — only now the “ticking doomsday device” is not fiction. The threat is climate change, triggered by the burning of coal, oil and natural gas, and he pointed out that it all started in Glasgow with James Watt's steam engine powered by coal.

Johnson told the summit that humanity had run down the clock when it comes to climate change, and the time for action is now. He pointed out that the more than 130 world leaders who gathered had an average age of over 60, while the generations most harmed by climate change aren't yet born. Johnson called for the end of coal-fired power plants and gasoline-powered cars along with a huge influx of cash from rich nations to poor to help them switch to greener economies and adapt to the worsening climate impacts.

And that mood got only darker when United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres followed him.“We are digging our own graves,” Guterres said. “Our planet is changing before our eyes — from the ocean depths to mountaintops, from melting glaciers to relentless extreme weather events.” Britain's Prince Charles told the world leaders they need to “save our precious planet” and that “the eyes and hopes of the world are upon you.”