Humanity has ‘opened the gates of hell’: UN climate summit hears grim warning

Antonio Guterres delivered the comments on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, as politicians, as well as activists, business and civil society leaders met for the summit. 

The United Nations’ secretary-general issued another stark warning to world leaders on Wednesday, telling them “humanity has opened the gates of hell” and action must be taken in the wake of accelerating extreme weather.

Antonio Guterres delivered the comments on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, as politicians along with activists, business and civil society leaders met for a climate summit.

“Our focus here is on climate solutions and our task is urgent,” he said in his opening comments to the summit. “Climate action is dwarfed by the scale of the challenge. If nothing changes, we are heading towards a 2.8 degree temperature rise, towards a dangerous and unstable world.”

Guterres spoke about what he called “horrendous heat” having impacts on the world, ranging from farmers seeing their crops washed away by flooding, diseases being spawned by sweltering temperatures, and thousands fleeing historic fires.

With the increasing number of climate-related disasters, Guterres said world leaders are still not doing enough to curb pollution and wean off fossil fuels.

The summit was organized with the aim that only world leaders who came with new concrete actions would be able to address their peers on the issue.

Countries that produce the most heat-trapping gases themselves decided not to attend. Heads of state from China, India, Russia, the U.K. and France all skipped the summit.

The U.S. sent climate envoy, John Kerry, but he wasn’t given a speaking spot — instead California Gov. Gavin Newsom was able to speak about his state’s efforts.