The Decolonization in Action Podcast presents a chronological sweep of field recordings and interviews taken in Madrid during COP25, December 2019, by our guest host Dr. Sumugan Sivanesan.
It begins with the December 6 Manifestacíon in which around 500,000 people marched in the streets of Madrid, before tracing discussions at the Social Summit for the Climate (Cumbre Social por el Clima) at Complutense University and at other actions around the city. In front of the US embassy, this episode focuses on a demonstration led by Indigenous women who sang the Women’s Warrior Song, a song written by Martina Pierre from the Lil’wat First Nation that honors missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. Indigenous women face the highest rates of murder and sexual assault in North America, and in Madrid the song connected these crimes to extractivist fossil fuel industries operating on unceded Indigenous lands. The montage culminates five days later with a casserolado noise demonstration outside the COP, in support of Indigenous delegates, Fridays For Future, and other civil society groups staging a demonstration inside the COP against the removal of references to Human Rights in the negotiations and widespread reports of bullying and inaction.
This episode includes interviews and speeches by:
ASAD REHMAN, Executive Director of War on Want
VANESSA NAKATE, Founder of the Rise Up Movement
NICOLE FIGUEIREDO DE OLIVEIRA, Director of 350.org in Brazil and Latin America
MARTA BORDONS MARTÍNEZ, Climate activist, Fridays for Future Sevilla
MOÑEKA DE ORO, member of the Micronesia Climate Alliance
NIGEL HENRI ROBINSON, Denesuline organizer, radio host, and humorist from Cold Lake First Nations, Indigenous Climate Action
CHIEF DANA TIZYA-TRAMM, Vuntut Gwitchen First Nation
Muchas gracias to Grey Filastine and all who participated in Sound Swarm #5; Amalen, Danny, Delia, and Kevin from the Artivist Network; Fiona Carpe Deville and Stijn Verhoeff.
And a special thanks to Ruth Miller from Native Movement, who shared the history and meaning behind the Women’s Warrior Song.