Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • COMMENT

Why I broke the law for climate change

Lawyer Farhana Yamin explains what drove her to civil disobedience after three decades of environmental advocacy for the IPCC, the United Nations and more.
  1. Farhana Yamin

    1. Farhana Yamin is an international climate-change lawyer, activist and associate fellow at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House, London. She was a lead author of report chapters by Working Groups II and III in three IPCC assessments from 1994 to 2007, a negotiator for the Alliance of Small Island States on the Kyoto Protocol and adviser to the Republic of the Marshall Islands for the 2015 Paris agreement. She is founder of the not-for-profit organization Track 0.

    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

Farhana Yamin posing for a portrait at the Extinction Rebellion offices in London

Environmental lawyer and activist Farhana Yamin at the London offices of the global movement Extinction Rebellion. Credit: Richard Saker/Guardian/eyevine

On 16 April this year, I superglued my hands to the pavement outside the headquarters of the oil company Shell in London, surrounded by dozens of policemen. Once unstuck, I was arrested for causing criminal damage. I have been a lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for three of its five assessment reports, and an adviser in the United Nations climate negotiations for almost 30 years.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 573, 337-339 (2019)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-02736-9

This article is part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of more than 250 media outlets to highlight the issue of climate change.

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links