16-year old Swede Greta Thunberg leading 7,500 climate demonstrators in Brussels

16-year-old Swede, Greta Thunberg, came to walk alongside the thousands of young Belgians skipping school, attracting much media attention. The participants were less numerous in this new edition: 7,500 against 11,000 last week. Thunberg launched the school strike for the climate

The seventh in a row for the climate started with some trouble. While students were ready to jump off the North Station, the arrival of Greta Thunberg complicated things. The journalists surrounded the teenager who’s afraid to show the world that it is time to act against global warming.

Journalists were pressing so much that no one could move without being crushed. The press was finally pushed back and a human chain surrounded Greta Thunberg but also Anuna De Wever and Adelaide Charlier, muses of the Youth for Climate movement in Belgium.

At the South Station, the youth listened to the speeches of young Anuna de Wever and Adelaide Charlier, but also representatives of mobilizations in Germany and the Netherlands. The two Belgians have decried the attitude of the political world.

“We will continue to fight,” Anuna de Wever warned, noting that “what Greta did is braver than anything I’ve ever seen from world leaders.” The young German who initiated the movement in her country stressed that “we should be really angry. We do not have the time and it is our future.”

The speeches ended with the intervention of Greta Thunberg, cheered even before having had time to speak. Every word was applauded by the thousands of participants who came to listen to her. She called the Belgian mobilization “incredible” and assured the demonstrators that they did not change the world but saved it.

The seventh march gathered 7,500 participants, less than last week, which saw 11,000 young people in the streets in Brussels. The crowd dispersed around 15:30 in front of the South Station.