More than 60 organizations from Brazil and around the world will gather in the COP30 host city to map out strategies of global resistance and demand climate justice**
By Casa NINJA Amazônia
From May 30 to June 2, Belém do Pará, in the Brazilian Amazon, will become the center of a global articulation for climate justice. The city will host, for the first time, the in-person meeting of the Political Commission of the People’s Summit toward COP30, bringing together more than 60 organizations, networks and social movements from Brazil, Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe.
The agenda begins with a political act on May 30 at 4 pm at the Federal University of Pará (UFPA), under the theme “From the Amazon to the World. Climate Justice Now!” With the slogan “All rivers lead to Belém. It is time to listen to the voices of the territories. There is no future without us,” the act will be an international call to action and denunciation against environmental racism, false solutions and the climate collapse advancing over the most vulnerable territories and bodies.
The mobilization takes place in a critical global context. According to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), 2024 was the hottest year ever recorded, with a global average temperature 1.55°C above pre-industrial levels. This increase marks a worrying milestone, as it surpasses for the first time the 1.5°C limit set as a target in the Paris Agreement to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
Meanwhile, UN Conferences (COPs) continue to fail to ensure real climate finance for the most affected countries. COP29, held in Baku, approved funding far below what is needed and opened the door to loans that may further indebt the Global South.
In the United States, President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January 2025 to withdraw the country from the Paris Agreement for the second time, reinforcing US isolation from global climate initiatives.
In Brazil, the climate tragedy in Rio Grande do Sul, with more than 160 deaths caused by floods in 2024, highlights the absence of effective public adaptation policies. In addition, the recent progress of Bill 364/19 in the Brazilian Congress threatens Indigenous peoples, weakens environmental licensing rules and opens even more space for agribusiness and illegal mining.
Across Latin America, Africa and Asia, the number of projects that, under the discourse of a “green transition,” expel traditional communities from their territories in the name of carbon offsetting and market-driven bioeconomy is increasing. Violence against environmental defenders is also rising. In 2023, 177 environmental activists were murdered worldwide, 88 of them in Latin America, according to Global Witness.
Denunciations from the peripheries will expose COP30 contradictions
The political act at UFPA is intended not only as a symbolic moment but as a concrete space to denounce the false solutions presented in the official COP30 forums. Leaders from different territories will show that real responses to the climate crisis are already being built in urban peripheries, traditional communities and quilombos, and that ignoring these solutions means perpetuating the problems. The Summit thus positions itself as a legitimate popular counterpoint to the institutional narrative that prioritizes large infrastructure projects and economic interests over lives in the territories.
Among the cases to be denounced are those of the Vila da Barca community and the quilombola territory of Abacatal, which clearly illustrate what social and environmental movements have called environmental racism. Decisions made without consultation shift negative impacts onto Black, peripheral and vulnerable populations, while promoting a “green” image aimed at the outside world.
Vila da Barca and environmental racism in the name of revitalization
In Vila da Barca, one of the largest stilt-house communities in the Amazon, residents have been facing the direct impacts of the Nova Doca project, one of the urban infrastructure initiatives linked to Belém’s preparation to host COP30. Debris and sewage from wealthier neighborhoods have been dumped near the community, without dialogue or any consultation process. What is presented as revitalization has in practice meant environmental degradation, evictions and rights violations. “It is environmental racism, yes, because they only dump what is worthless in the places where we live,” says Suane Barreirinhas, a popular educator and community leader.
This reality will be brought to the act as an example of the gap between the sustainability discourse promoted internationally and the concrete actions implemented in Amazonian cities.
Quilombo Abacatal and the road that threatens a quilombola territory
The case of the Abacatal quilombo, located in Ananindeua, will also be denounced. The community will be directly impacted by the construction of Avenida Liberdade, a 14 km highway planned to “improve urban mobility” in the Belém metropolitan region. The road will cut through areas of the quilombola territory, affecting water sources, agricultural production spaces and sites of historical and spiritual value to the community.
Even after the preparation of a Quilombola Component Study, which found that 100 percent of residents oppose the project, the Pará state government moved forward without complying with ILO Convention 169, which requires free, prior and informed consultation. The violation of rights will be a central point raised by quilombola leaders at the Summit.
Territories will present real solutions
The experiences and denunciations shared during the act will reinforce the Summit’s purpose of exposing market-based solutions presented as sustainable and affirming ancestral, community-based and popular practices as concrete and viable paths to confront the climate crisis with social justice. Solutions are already being built in the territories in the form of agroecology, community reforestation, people-led water management, solidarity economy, and Indigenous and quilombola knowledge. Making these voices protagonists is what will give legitimacy to the transformations the Amazon and the world need.
From the Amazon to the world, the peoples hold the solutions
The People’s Summit proposes a territory-rooted agenda that connects climate justice struggles with historic demands such as agrarian reform, agroecology, food sovereignty, a just energy transition, and the fight against racism and climate colonialism. More than 700 organizations and social networks have joined the process since 2023, including women’s collectives, Indigenous peoples, youth groups, urban and labor movements.
The May meeting marks the consolidation of collective strategies for the main event in November, when the Summit expects to bring together around 15,000 people in Belém for a broad program. In addition to plenaries to build a proposal letter to be submitted to global leaders, activities already planned include a river flotilla at the opening, a Global Act with a street march on the 15th, and fairs with the participation of organizations from Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania.
Reproduced from the Mídia Ninja portal, with a photo by Viviane Bastos. Click HERE.