TIME TO STOP
PURCHASING
FOSSIL FUELS
FROM PUTIN
As we write this appeal, bombs are falling on Ukraine. The rockets, launched by the Russian army, are destroying Ukrainian cities, schools, hospitals and civilian shelters. The war started by Vladimir Putin is all-encompassing and cruel, and continues to be co-funded by EU member states purchasing Russian fossil fuels. It’s time to cut the coal, oil and gas that Ukrainians are paying for with their blood.
We call on the President of the European Commission to immediately impose an embargo on Russian fossil fuels and on Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to end their imports to Poland.
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Instead of phasing out fossil fuels, we are continuing to import Russian oil, gas and coal. It’s time to say it loud and clear: the money that the EU pays Russia for their fossil fuels co-funds the rockets launched at Ukraine.
In Poland, thousands of people abandoned their regular tasks and have headed to our Eastern border to provide aid, food and shelter for those who need it in this tragic time. Ordinary people are making their couches and extra mattresses available, and sharing everything they have with people who are strangers to them. All while the CEOs of fossil fuel companies attempt to turn the war and the tragedy of millions into profit.
While we rush to the East with food and clothing, tanker ships filled with Russian gas and oil embark for Polish and EU shores.
The same oil, gas and coal that co-finance Putin’s plans accelerate the climate crisis. The climate crisis is already here and it has the same source as the war in Ukraine: fossil fuels.
Two days after Putin began his war in Ukraine, Svitlana Krakovska, a Ukrainian environmental scientist and member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said: “Human induced climate change and the war on Ukraine have the same roots, fossil fuels, and our dependence on them.”
An appeal to Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission and Mateusz Morawiecki, Prime Minister of Poland:
Dear President von der Leyen and Prime Minister Morawiecki,
No system based on fossil fuels can grant us safety. It is time to end not just the dependence on oil, gas and coal imported from Russia, but the dependence on fossil fuels altogether. The EU needs an immediate and strong turn towards renewable energy sources, increased energy efficiency and an improvement in public transportation. We must enable their full development in all member states of the European Union. This is the only way in which we can decrease our demand for fossil fuels and it is the only way to cut Russian fuel imports once and for all. Replacing one source of fossil fuel imports with another is not a sustainable long term solution. We call for an immediate end to the dependence on oil, gas and coal for the sake of a safe and peaceful future.