Greta Thunberg. Image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons (Stefan Muller).
By Diksha Batra ’26
Staff Writer
Over the last month, Greta Thunberg has been arrested twice for protesting the expansion of a coal mine in the German village of Lützerath, according to CNN. Most recently, she was arrested on Tuesday, Jan. 17. A spokesperson for the German police told CNN that “Thunberg had been the main speaker at the rally on Saturday and had ‘surprisingly’ returned to protest on Sunday when she was detained the first time and then again on Tuesday.”
Greta Thunberg is a 20-year-old environmental activist from Stockholm, Sweden. After learning about the issue of climate change in 2011 at age eight, “Thunberg successfully urged her parents to change their lifestyle to lower the family’s carbon footprint, such as adopting veganism and ending plane travel,” according to an article from Iowa State University. Thunberg started her career in late 2018 when she “demonstrated outside the Swedish parliament and began giving speeches to protest inaction against climate change,” the article said. Thunberg inspired students worldwide to protest in their communities, leading to the development of “a school climate strike movement called Fridays for Future,” which went on to include multi-city protests in which more than one million students participated.
According to Context news, Thunberg’s work led to her being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019. In the same year, she was named “one of the world’s most influential people by Time magazine.” According to Context, Thunberg responded with a tweet that read “Now I am speaking to the whole world.”
Her work has awarded her with many honors, including titles and money. However, Thunberg donates all money she wins from prizes to different organizations. According to Context news, Thunberg donated “a $100,000 award she received to UNICEF to buy soap, masks and gloves to protect children from the coronavirus pandemic” in April 2020. In July 2020, she donated the $1 million in prize money from the Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity to charity. Additionally, she has donated about $120,000 to the WHO foundation to support the vaccine-sharing plan, Context reported.
Her work towards fighting for environmentalist causes has continued, most recently with her protest of the Lützerath coal mine. According to CBS news, Thunberg was first detained by the German police on Jan. 13, 2023. CBS reported that “Thunberg was near the German village of Lützerath, where an energy company is seeking to demolish the remains of what they say is an abandoned town to make way for the mine’s expansion.” Video recorded by Reuters shows police officers picking Thunberg up and carrying her by her arms and legs away from the sit-in.
According to CNN, many activists have been in Lützerath for more than two years, “occupying the homes abandoned by former residents after they were evicted, most by 2017, to make way for the lignite coal mine.” Lützerath has been the center of attention for climate activists because of “its position on the edge of the opencast lignite coal mine, Garzweiler II.” This has faced criticism from climate groups, because “lignite is the most polluting type of coal, which itself is the most polluting fossil fuel” according to CNN. Because of the expansion of the mines, many surrounding villages have been destroyed.
CNN reported that due to the success of Germany’s Green Party in the 2021 federal elections, “some had hoped the expansion would be canceled,” but the expansion continued its course. In October 2022, the government came to an agreement with RWE, the power company behind the mine, that “saved several villages,” but Lützerath was not protected by the deal. In addition, RWE agreed to phase-out coal energy production starting in 2030.
The deal with RWE became a cause for dissatisfaction with the Green Party. The Party, which supported the deal, stated that the mine expansion was necessary to relieve the current energy crisis in Germany, and denied that expansion of the mine would lead to higher emissions. In an interview with CNN, a recent Green Party supporter commented that “it’s such an absurd and catastrophic scenario that Germany, the country where everyone else thinks we have green [policies], is destroying a village to burn coal in the middle of the climate crisis.”
While protesting, Thunberg “was one of several who ‘rushed towards the ledge,’ presumably referring to the brink of mine” according to CBS. The police stopped Thunberg and other protesters, carrying them “out of the immediate danger area to establish their identity,” a police spokesperson told Reuters. In the video recorded by Reuters, Thunberg can be seen laughing while still being held by police. CBS reported that Thunberg confirmed the detainment the next day. She wrote on Twitter, “Yesterday I was part of a group that peacefully protested the expansion of a coal mine in Germany. We were kettled by police and then detained but were let go later that evening. Climate protection is not a crime.”