tv Close up Deutsche Welle December 11, 2019 8:30am-9:01am CET
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people of east germany in the mideast tense the crowd clamors for the german unity journalist peyton borg was at the scene. 30 years later he looks back on the title in dresden. starts december 19th on g.w. . people it's serious. stuff it's the 11th hour our planet is threatening to burn up. india 100 years or grows gone for decades scientists have been warning of the dangers of climate change with very little response to the worst case scenario has come to pass. we're burning fossil fuels at an alarming pace i think was how do you feel on the scale of 0 to 1005
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and we don't want to miss out on our holidays away either the file i want to be on is i'm not ashamed i'm looking forward to my vacation what's wrong with us why aren't we willing to protect our climate. is we can't keep on like ghost on the phone. it's a friday afternoon and i've come to hamburg or climate activists are ramping up their protests. i want to know how far people will go in their fight to stop climate change. i've been invited by tino the guy writing a telephone number on his belly. it's the number of a legal advice center in case he gets arrested. she lets him know what's the plan for today you know. we want to draw attention to what's going on inside show people
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a bit of what's happening on our planet right now to highlight the climate crisis look at us with some of us i'm not sure what's going to happen but i'm looking forward to it. this i'm sure will blockade a few things and cause some disruption here in hamburg today so because and home talking humbles to. tino and the other activists decided to block this street. they move fast before the police can stop them the activists have taken over the road. they're part of the extinction rebellion movement or x. are for short their goal is to stop what they see as the potential extinction of the human race. some call x r the radical sister of the fridays for a future school protest movement civil disobedience without violence is their guiding principle. but the
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authorities are not impressed. the police tell the protestors that the demonstration is unauthorized there to clear the road and move to the sidewalk. the relaxed sit in as soon broken up. i. put tino and a few others who remain seated they know fully well they could get arrested and in a way that's exactly what they want. would you go to jail for this accident just yet yes. because i think will get more publicity and people will think about why someone who is protesting against climate change would suffer violence or even be jailed. but why do you think it's necessary to block the road. because the climate crisis is already here it's not just climate change the crisis is art. making itself felt as if this was touted as
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a relatively big demo but there were maybe 200 people sitting in the road they held up the traffic for an hour i don't know whether that's going to make people jump on their couches and say i need to do something about climate change it certainly wasn't anything revolutionary here today. but is a climate revolution what we need anyway. germany seems pretty divided on this question i'm going to meet a man who has long said things can't continue as they are professor andreas are sleeze gives climate lectures like this one on you tube. a climate scientist he's calculated what we need to do to avert the impending disaster. but what would you say about climate change is it 5 to 12 or more like 5 past 12 or is the entire clock broken already. in terms of the out system in nature and i think it's one minute to 12 curtness so we could still make it unnecessary climate goals could
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still be achieved so when i look at society i'm not so sure. about this there it's more like half past 12 we had a bigger homes way heating more have high living standards taking more flights and that totally cancels out all the feel good things we've done. to an attorney. if we continue like this a further rise in sea levels would be one consequence people here along germany's baltic sea coast wouldn't be the only ones to lose their homes but we've known all this for ages and still we can't get our act together and germany as elsewhere to stop it must be serious problem i see is that we actually feel quite good about ourselves we think we're doing a lot already we have our solar panels on the roof and a green energy as a nation we're planning to transition to renewables there is one which is costing a lot of money yes the highest electricity prices in europe and we have done a lot as the politicians like to point out but then people are lulled into
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a false sense of security. awfully says germany needs to reduce its carbon emissions by 5 percent each year for the past decade the country has managed only around one percent a year. but why are we not panicking at least a bit. short of this and quickly no i think we have a built in optimist. and we each think it wasn't a fact made on a problem with c o 2 of course is you can't see it you can't taste it or smell it. but when the other problems aren't with household waste for example we introduced restrictions on that and on effluent and sewage to say something we want to stand there not good policy oh to that's not the case what's your plan to spec. but that's something we can change with this camera it costs 90000 euros what can it do it can film c o 2. it does look
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a bit gross the way it's coming out of the exhaust pipe. but can images like these change our perception i show them to passengers had take an airport in berlin this is what comes out of the league it really looks like like it's burning right. to this is bella saga and henrik have come from copenhagen for a short visit to berlin. with a do without things to help stop climate change. would you be ok with not going to holidays far away because of the climate change which your view on the not buying as much and also as i do i will die one day and i want to experience the world so. you somewhere when you enter a plane that you are ashamed by being like using it because of all the pollution i'm not ashamed i'm not i want to be honest i'm not ashamed i'm looking forward to
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my vacation i'm thinking oh i'm going to my vacation i'm away from stress and bad things and i want to go there and have 9 staycation so yeah that's what all people think. right i don't want to live but let's fund it. so the camera didn't exactly have the desired effect. but what can i say i'm no different even though i ought to know better. at least it's what i hope i'm up on holiday myself now i'm inclined to corsica fungibility yes i'm flying my family and i could have taken the car which would have been quite so bad for the environment. but i'm flying because of the spill and i just don't have the time for a long journey since i have to get this report finished in other words i also have my own excuses as to why i'm abusing the environment and that's a problem with this is. if we can't be trusted to do the right thing
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do we need legislation instead to be honest i'd quite like the state to give me a little less freedom when it comes to protecting the climate. than maybe i'd take the train more often. like on a compazine. she's a member of the european parliament the green party her constituency is in eastern germany finish. you off to how often do you take a flight to brussels or stross lowest possible to comb. his fez with but my always try to take the train if i can like today and usually it works but it's a long way from berlin dresden candidates to brussels and stressful and. even a 7 to 9 hours on the train sometimes i have to fly because i have an important meeting in the morning and there's no other way. unless i was even lauded on it one of the party leaders for well that topic was photographed at the airport where he
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was taking a flight and people wrote oh the greens don't practice what they preach how do you deal with accusations like that that doesn't include political and often. does us i think it's something of a distraction tactic adopted by opponents of the greens so they can say you arguments on the climate valid because you don't abide by the rules yourself and it's important to expose that but obviously politicians. also need to limit their carbon footprint as much as possible digs even sticky shots even you should everyone just be free to do what they want to do or do we need restrictions out of the green sea it wouldn't be a good idea to ban all short haul flights that have to i think people tend to have question egypt reaction when you ban things but they also react strongly to anything that affects their pocketbook so we just need to make flying more expensive to reflect the truth price because flying is massively subsidized and trains need to be made a lot more attractive and feel that my job
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a top but surely the only reason the greens don't just call for a ban on all short haul flights is because they're afraid of being punished at the ballot box for doesn't from what's the reason. you haven't been because we think they're more effective methods because i meant bands are very effective if it was right that we'd 1st have to get it through parliament and we need to find a majority i think you do need to be accepting to a certain extent towards your coalition partner in government but also towards the general public otherwise people just get angry with you and i'll stop. i get it the greens don't want to be seen as the party that's anti everything again this tactic probably gets them support for their initiatives but is it really the way to stop climate change. which i know says tino and the other activists from extinction rebellion. they're calling for net 0 carbon emissions by 2025. and to
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help hammer home their message they're already planning their next move in hamburg they're going to stage a symbolic funeral everyone's dressed in black for the occasion except for one. set up so now everyone meets in your teams sorry a quick question i don't have any black pants with me. might have would need to be i'm sorry muttered back in berlin. officer. 35 year old tino is traveling quite a lot at the moment. campaigning for the environment has been a full time job for him over the past 6 months paid of course. that's in addition to being a student and the father of 2 children so things are pretty tight financially it's inside the. studio for the moment i'm getting a student loan and i am studying on zones i hope i can continue to do that. otherwise yes it's not easy i had to give up my job as i couldn't really do it
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properly. to give just to as always i suppose right now there are various individuals who buy train tickets for me sometimes help me out at the end of the month if they see things are tight lipped it's. the funeral march gets under way the mourners for the climate are heading towards the elbow river. extinction rebellion is looking to provoke an emotional response to convey a sense of urgency. for me it feels more like a school play not the emotional impact they're looking for. the group want to target the hamburg cruise days it's a maritime festival celebrating the big cruise liners that dock in hamburg. the ships are big time polluters that's why extinction rebellion is here. tino and a few of the others have a special task here today the contents of their pockets will provide an extra
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portion of popcorn. they want it to be graphic. so that the message comes across. it's dignified i stand here before the blood of children children like me and to be honest seeing it makes me feel afraid i'm afraid of a future that without immediate action will be destroyed by the climate crisis. what amazes me is that many of those attending the cruise days aren't at all opposed to the demonstration. trinity. i think it's very good but i think that we need a lot more of us in our lives and does not need to get the message to me just can't keep on like this risky. business there's been a lot of questions about whether x. are supports the democratic system leading voices in the movement don't believe
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politicians are capable of addressing climate change tino agrees. with the police what about the government lots of people say it's up to the politicians to do something but you don't think they're up to it. i knew he was shooting it's a guy no they're not we can see that is the but they're not getting the job done and i don't know if they're capable of it. for whatever reason the politicians aren't taking the necessary actions or able to take them. we need a new form of legitimisation. it sounds like you're calling for a revolution. aleutian would mean we're looking to topple someone in power. that's what it sounds like when you say democracies are in up to the task maybe they just need a bit of a push. that push according to extinction rebellion as a national citizen's assembly a group of randomly selected citizens who are representative of the population with expert advice the citizens would prescribe legally binding measures for the
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government to implement i'm not sure if that's a democratically legitimate process. i've come to a rally sponsored by germany's automobile club the 80 ac one part of the country dreams of car free cities here drivers hit the gas as much as possible. i'm going to accompany him he's been competing in rallies for 2 years now. and has converted b.m.w. eat 36 tim drives over roads and fields. here in this rural part of central germany it's difficult to get by without your own transport but. what if you're. close to your heart is it your baby or just a car. some of it meant as much to me as a baby and even ronnie driving would definitely be the wrong for me. i always say you don't give a name to a pig you plan to slaughter. this
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while i'm sitting on the road. 7 tim just can't understand the whole debate over cars. who've been in a hoarse cry if you live in the city you have a good network of public transport so you don't need a car but we don't live in the city. and there i think the whole debate is just silly to be honest. when i see people at the on a motor show jumping on cars and holding up hate posters i think they lost it. i was guilty do you feel from 0 to 100. personally i don't own a car but then i live in berlin so i don't need one. but that doesn't mean that i don't think this is awesome.
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for 140 horsepower. i've got goosebumps. here at the rally the concerns of the climate activists feel like a world away. and tim is doubtful that the extinction rebellion protests will change that. the president doesn't know i don't know what these people are thinking when they sit down in the middle of the road they're lucky the drive to stop for them. on him and i think that's the way to change car drivers minds. they tell you the drivers don't get out of the car was punish them. that's why doesn't it actively now with activists that oppose automobiles and they always chant that they're doing this for your children so they're protesting against cars for the benefit of your children. about to become a dad myself. without a car i'd have to go everywhere with my child on foot or by bike what good would
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that do. if anything goes wrong i need a car to get my child to the hospital fast at the thought of more speed limits or a ban on gas guzzlers isn't popular here either. timber. leaves the debate over climate change could divide german society in the same way it was divided a few years ago when the country was split over the arrival of large numbers of migrants and refugees. as. soon as we feel that our freedom was being curtailed you could have masses of people coming out against. i really think that this whole climate debate with gratitude for future etc could split the nation. could germany see something similar to the yellow best movement in france. raising gas prices there led to months of violent protests. so far it doesn't look like
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it's going that way in germany as far as i can see. and hear the rally i'm the only one wearing a yellow vest. let's see if it stays that way. but the fear of public anger is preventing german politicians from taking action says climate scientist and. he points to climate engineering as one example it's very controversial in germany climate engineering involves measures such as actively capturing c o 2 from the atmosphere and storing it in underground rock formations for example believes will have to resort to such measures. are scientists we feel uneasy about the whole idea of climate engineering i say it involves major interventions in nature. and it would be arrogant to think that technology alone could solve this problem for we see no other way of achieving our climate objectives we can't reduce
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emissions enough we still want to eat certain foods have industrial agriculture fine so we need to come up with something else. this. site near the eastern town of cat scene saw germany's only major experiment in climate engineering to date c o 2 was injected into the ground here the experiment was successful and completed without incident. since then no major experiments have been authorised in germany because of repeated public protests. including the government needs to make it clear that we can't just do nothing no solution when everyone's a winner whatever we do there will be losers whenever we change something someone will be on happy for us for your frewen so we need to make clear that doing nothing is not an option to this light. i come to a small town on the border between the states of has and thuringia this is what
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ashley's means when he talks about winners and losers. a new power line called the suit link is due to pass right by this town it's supposed to take wind generated energy from northern germany to the industry rich south. cattle breeder tossed and mother and many of his neighbors oppose the plant they don't want ground in the area to be dug up and trees cut down to make way for the underground power line. it's actually pretty good but you know the politicians in berlin and many other cities say we all have our part to do and make sacrifices to ensure we can transition to renewables and being the 100 i do that when we installed 100 kilowatt solar systems working with a bio gas plant was in august a lot of experts say we don't need this power line it won't be clean energy and that we should have the centralized power supply instead so there are ways around it you just need the political will and i think that's what's missing so we have.
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guns or to distribute both how angry are you about what's being planned in ireland right now that sounds it doesn't like a plan for the 1000000 of those i don't want to end tonight girl and really you know. a number of citizens initiatives have organized a bike tour along the plan to route of the suit link to protest against it. but if germany is really going to move to renewables such power lines will be needed. at least that's according to the government and many experts and environmental groups . the politicians are convincing the public of the need for these things in fact sometimes they're part of the protest themselves christina leiva ta is a member of the state parliament and an uncle americal c.d.u. party the same party that's been the driving force behind sitting just at you the i support the citizens initiative hollow hostage like i'm i had something similar where i live that also had to do with the switch to renewables i wanted to build
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a hard job and it took storage plant in a place of stunning natural beauty it's just not on we need to preserve our landscape we're only tenants here on earth and we want to pass it on to our children and grandchildren in good condition ones and condemn them and then by death they gave us but isn't that the whole reason why we need to transfer to. nobles and have new power lines for wind energy. it so that our children and grandchildren will be able to continue living on this earth right. the question remains what direction will we take radical measures to combat climate change or business as usual. these 2 worlds clash at the i a motor show in frankfurt the car lovers interested in the latest models on the one hand on the other hundreds of activists who come to blockade the show for a day. tino is once again part of the group.
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the protesters are soon in position and in good voice. i. but this time tino is not getting involved in the sit in he finds this too confrontational i'm not into this we hate s.u.v.s thing if you're going to say that then you need to say we hate cars i think we all need to get together and look at our lifestyle and not just the s.u.v. drivers whose distance is responding forcefully about all this is going to but isn't this more radical approach actually what's needed because nobody s.u.v.s and cars are all bad get rid of them all does the softer let's talk about it approach really get results. it's like that this here at least provokes a response like let's not the subtle but yes yes it provokes a response and sometimes i wonder whether the softer let's talk about it approach as you say will allow us to make the change in the time we have left like in the
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next 2 or 3 years. this is huge. but i think it's difficult to say that it needs to be more radical and stronger because then people stop listening if someone is just hurling abuse at me i feel angry too i don't listen to them i believe in public debate and. certainly the public here is not being won over. i love how you said you saw nothing you're a disgrace to anything to draw your attention. at the end a man is left lying on the ground he tried to get through the blockade isn't that probably completely against violence and everyone here supports that consensus and all that we do know if you would support it. but not everyone interprets it that way. this stuff some of them are really violent i'm sympathetic to their arguments but there is no excuse for violence pushed aside and he landed hard on the ground there's no excuse for that up consistent this with clergymen cease fire they
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complaining there's electric cars in there too we're already doing everything against climate change and see just a few hours to differentiate cause we certainly don't need this it's too violent. one thing is clear we can only combat climate change if we work together. i can look at safety honest how hopeful are you that we can turn all this around and that your daughter will inherit a world that's worth living in. i. say something. like you're not going to say anything i suppose that's an answer in itself. i think i'm with teano. we need politicians who don't just take the path of least resistance but
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communicate and explain and if necessary make unpopular decisions it's this kind of leadership that we're lacking which i think public opinion on climate change isn't actually that divided in germany many of the car lovers that i spoke to in frankfurt also said we need to take action. we managed to agree to phase out nuclear power in germany but that came after the meltdown in the fukushima power plant. do we want to wait for a climate meltdown before we take more radical action to move reading the. beauty. of the e.u. . in. any. place.
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this is t w news coming to you live from berlin taking a controversial stand against genocide charges for peace i called. prepares to defend beyond largest military against allegations that they committed atrocities against her him most folks also coming up after weeks of impeachment hearings democrats in the u.s. announce their charges against president. a.q. simple book use of power and instructing congress he denies any wrongdoing. and more tremors of the volcano.
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