UNITED NATIONS, March 1 (UPI) -- U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said this generation's battle against global warming is equal to his generation's battle against a nuclear winter.
It was part of a message he gave a U.N. International School conference, calling on the world's younger generation to take better care of Planet Earth in the face of global warming than his own.
"We are all complicit in the process of global warming," Ban said. "Unsustainable practices are deeply entrenched in our everyday lives. But in the absence of decisive measures, the true cost of our actions will be borne by succeeding generations, starting with yours."
"My generation has been somewhat careless in looking after our one and only planet," he added, recalling his childhood in war-ravaged Korea as the starting point of his identification with the United Nations which ended hostilities on the peninsula.
"For my generation, coming of age at the height of the cold war, fear of a nuclear winter seemed the leading existential threat on the horizon," the secretary-general told the students. "Today, war continues to threaten countless men, women and children across the globe. It is the source of untold suffering and loss and the majority of the United Nation's work still focuses on preventing and ending conflict.
"But the danger posed by war to all of humanity -- and to our planet -- is at least matched by the climate crisis and global warming," he said.
