UNFCCC Censorship of Palestine Solidarity: NGOs call out moral crisis within the UN climate process
Civil society organisations participating in the United Nations climate negotiations have condemned what they describe as the UNFCCC Secretariat’s ongoing and arbitrary censorship of expressions of solidarity with Palestine.
The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ), Climate Action Network (CAN) International, Women and Gender Constituency (WGC) and the Alliance of Non Governmental Radical Youth (ANGRY) jointly condemned UNFCCC Secretariat’s demand for the removal of the phrase “End the Siege” from a planned peaceful civil society action highlighting the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Gaza – despite a similar protest which went ahead on Monday which was allowed to use the phrase “End the Siege”.
Civil society groups describe this demand as not only baseless, but a grave moral and political failure.
In light of this explicit censorship, civil society groups have taken the unprecedented step of suspending all future applications for Palestine solidarity actions within the UNFCCC framework.
“For the past two years, the UNFCCC Secretariat has tried to silence our movement’s unwavering solidarity with Palestine.
We have been censored, edited, erased—while a genocide unfolds in Gaza.
Let’s not pretend this is about procedure. This is political.
The UNFCCC secretariat is choosing to censor words like genocide, occupation, and siege—as Israel starves, bombs, and massacres an entire population”, said Rachitaa Gupta from Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ).
The climate justice movements engaging within the UNFCCC process have historically used the space inside Blue Zone, a region administered by the UNFCCC Secretariat and under the UN rules, to hold “actions”, peoples led demonstration and protest, as a tactic to raise their demands.
In the past two years the UNFCCC Secretariat has increasingly brought new rules to censor phrases like “From river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and in its latest attempt the word “siege” in the demand “End the Siege” for an action being registered by activists.
“Two days ago we were told that within these halls it would be inappropriate to call to ‘End the Siege’. Because according to the UNFCCC, objecting to the enforced starvation of Palestinian children is not politically sensitive enough, not related enough to the climate.
How many times must we explain that colonialism and climate injustice are inseparable? How many times must we explain before you understand that white supremacy is killing us?” said Hajar al-Betalji from ANGRY.
The UNFCCC Secretariat has repeatedly tried to hide behind the words and phrases like ‘neutrality’, ‘party driven process’, and ‘this is a climate conference and this action is not related to climate’.
“Censoring us to call things by their names is not protecting neutrality—it is protecting impunity.
It prioritizes the comfort of perpetrators over the survival of impacted. This is not neutrality. This is not what the secretariat calls “a constructive environment”. This is censorship, cowardice and failure impacts of military occupation, siege warfare, and systematic environmental destruction.” said Gina Cortés representing the Women and Gender Constituency (WGC).
The situation in Gaza has been described as a “siege” by a string of UN leaders, agencies and international human rights bodies – including UN Secretary-General António Guterres; Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner‑General; Volker Türk, UN High Commissioner Human Rights; Martin Griffiths, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs; Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine; and WHO Director-General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Jacobo Ocharan, Climate Action Network International, said:
“A red line was crossed this week. The UNFCCC claims to stand for climate justice, but how can there be justice when it silences the voices of those being annihilated?
When a Palestinian cannot even say ‘I am Palestinian’ in a UN space during a genocide, we are not dealing with neutrality – we are witnessing erasure. The same powers driving the climate crisis are driving this genocide – and now they are trying to silence civil society for speaking the truth.
We will not be silenced. We will not back down. Justice for Palestine is justice for all.”
“The links between climate justice and Palestinian liberation are not theoretical—they are documented, undeniable, and systemic. UN Special Rapporteurs have already made these connections explicit, recognizing the ongoing genocide and its environmental dimensions.
We are witnessing ecocide in Gaza Feminist have spent decades exposing how militarism intersects with environmental destruction. Our work reveals what the UNFCCC refuses to acknowledge: the military- industrial complex is among the world’s largest polluters, yet its emissions remain systematically excluded from climate accounting”, said Gina, stating that climate movements worldwide understand what UNFCCC leadership refuses to acknowledge.
“They tell us our slogans had to be changed. That we cannot not use the word siege. That genocide is too political. Too offensive. Offensive to who? Offensive to which governments? We are done negotiating. We are done watering down the horror. We are done justifying our grief.
We are done asking permission to speak. You do not get to silence the voices of Global South peoples—those who have survived colonization, war, displacement, and the violence of climate injustice—and then hold up our photos like we’re part of your success story’ Rachitaa ended the press conference at this note making it clear that this time⸺There will be no backing down.
On Friday, CAN International distributed a special edition of its ECO newsletter at the Bonn venue, focusing on the UNFCCC Secretariat’s demand for the removal of the phrase “End the Siege” from a planned peaceful civil society action highlighting the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Gaza.
