Colombia - President Addresses United Nations General Debate, 77th Session (English) | #UNGA

Gustavo Petro Urrego, President, addresses the general debate of the 77th Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations (New York, 20-26 September 2022). Colombian President Gustavo Petro today (20 Sep) said the war on drugs and the fight against the climate crisis have “failed,” while the coca plant is “demonized,” and coal and oil are “protected.” In his address to the General Assembly’s General Debate, Petro said “the jungle is burning, gentlemen, while you wage war and play with it. The jungle, the climatic pillar of the world, disappears with all its life. The great sponge that absorbs the planetary CO2 evaporates. The saving jungle is seen in my country as the enemy to defeat, as the weed to be extinguished. The space where coca grows and the peasants who grow it - because they have nothing else to cultivate - is demonized. For you, my country is of no interest except to poisons its jungles, to put its men in jail and to throw its women into exclusion. You are not interested in a c