Sheila Watt-Cloutier, a Canadian Inuit activist, delivers a touching and
powerful presentation on the impacts of Climate Change in the Arctic .
She has been a political representative for Inuit at the regional,
national and international levels, most recently as International Chair
for Inuit Circumpolar Council (formerly the Inuit Circumpolar
Conference). Watt-Cloutier has worked on a range of social and
environmental issues affecting Inuit, and has most recently focused on
persistent organic pollutants and global climate change. She has
received numerous awards and honors for her work, and has been featured
in a number of documentaries and profiled by journalists from all media.

In
1995, she was elected President of Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC)
Canada. ICC represents internationally the interests of Inuit in
Russia, Alaska, Canada and Greenland. In this position, she served as
the spokesperson for Arctic indigenous peoples in the negotiation of
the Stockholm Convention banning the manufacture and use of persistent
organic pollutants (POPs), including Polychlorinated biphenyl (PCBs) or
DDT. These substances pollute the Arctic food chain and accumulate in
the bodies of Inuit, many of whom continue to subsist on local country
food.

In 2002, Watt-Cloutier was elected International Chair of
ICC, a position she would hold until 2006. Most recently, her work has
emphasized the human face of the impacts of global climate change in
the Arctic. In addition to maintaining an active speaking and media
outreach schedule, she launched the world's first international legal
action on climate change.

On December 7, 2005, based on the
findings of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, which projects that
Inuit hunting culture may not survive the loss of sea ice and other
changes projected over the coming decades, she filed a petition, along
with 62 Inuit Hunters and Elders from communities across Canada and
Alaska, to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, alleging that
unchecked emissions of greenhouse gases from the United States have
violated Inuit cultural and environmental human rights as guaranteed by
the 1948 American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man.[5]
Although the IACHR decided against hearing her petition, the Commission
invited Ms. Watt-Cloutier to testify with her international legal team
(including lawyers from Earthjustice and the Center for International
Environmental Law) at their first hearing on climate change and human
rights on March 1, 2007.

She was nominated for the nobel peace prize in 2007, alongside Al Gore.

It is time to change our consumption habits in order to live sustainably with our environment .

Simply put, climate change will affect all people of all races, religion,economic situation,gender .....

ALTER-CITOYENS

Année de prod: 2007


Les Alters étaient au congrès Climat 2050 et ont eu la chance de
filmer la conférence de Madame Sheila Watt Cloutier, candidate au prix
Nobel de la paix, sur les changements climatiques et la culture inuit,
menacée par notre surconsommation. À voir pour l’éloquence du discours
et la beauté saisissante du grand Nord. SVP, êtes-vous interpellés ?