ABC/Paula LoboHe’s spent the last thirty years trying to save the Amazon rainforest, so it’s no surprise that Sting would speak out about the fires that are currently burning there, threatening an ecosystem that provides 20% of the world’s oxygen.
In a lengthy Facebook message posted on Tuesday, Sting wrote, “Legend has it that the Emperor Nero ‘fiddled while Rome burned’…[but] none of us…can be complacent about the tragic dimensions of the disaster taking place in the Amazon.”
He continued, “Amazonia is on fire at an unprecedented rate — 80% up from last year and with 39% more deforestation — and the world is suddenly taking notice.”
Calling the situation, “criminal negligence on a global scale,” Sting partly blames the crisis on “populist leaders” who deny climate change.
“This is no place for the outdated bromides of nationalism in a world where we all breathe the same air and where we will all suffer the consequences of this wilful negligence,” Sting continues.
He explains that the Amazon is called, “the lungs of the Earth for a reason,” noting, “It is a vital and irreplaceable link in the chain of well being on our planet…We simply cannot afford to let it burn.”
“We are fast approaching the tipping point where the fires will continue to burn and cannot be put out,” Sting wrote, warning that “countless species are in danger of extinction.”
Sting then calls for the Brazilian government to change its policy of opening up the Amazon for “exploitation,” and asks Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro to, “rethink his policies and change his actions and his incendiary rhetoric before it is too late.” He adds, “This is no time for fiddling; the world is burning.”
The message is also signed by Sting’s wife, Trudie Styler. The couple founded the Rainforest Foundation in 1987.
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