During his first speech at the UN General Assembly as the new President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro said that the world’s addiction to money, oil and carbon is destroying the rainforest and its people under the excuse of a “hypocritical” war against drugs. He also slammed the use of “poisons such as glyphosate” that have been used in aerial spraying campaigns in the past over Colombia’s rainforests to kill coca crops.

Mr. Petro described his country as one of the most beautiful and nature-rich in the world but said that blood also flowed into its rivers and biodiversity. He explained that violence in the rainforest was fuelled by the prosecution of the sacred plant of the Incas: the coca plant.

“As in a paradoxical crossroads. The forest that should be saved is at the same time being destroyed. To destroy the coca plant, they spray poisons such as glyphosate in massive amounts that drips into our waters, they arrest their cultivators and then imprison them,” he stated.