Guyana's President deflates BBC journalist regarding West's hypocrisy towards climate issue

While discussing Guyana’s recently found offshore oilfields Guyana's President Irfaan Ali had an argument with BBC’s Stephen Sackur over climate change.

The President has gone viral after calling out the Western Hypocrisy of the developed world during an interview. Irfaan Ali did not approve when journalist questioned him regarding Guyana’s plans to drill oil.

"It is expected that there will be 150 billion dollars worth of oil and gas extracted off your coast. That means, according to many experts, more than two billion tons of carbon emissions will come from your seabed from those reserves and be released into the atmosphere" Sackur said.

"Did you know that Guyana has a forest that is the size of England and Scotland combined, a forest that stores 19.5 gigatons of carbon, that we have kept alive?" the president stopped the journalist and asked.

Sackur tried to counter by asking if protecting Guyana’s forests gave him the right to release carbon in the atmosphere.

Making a strong statement on alleged Western Hypocrisy, the Guyana President said that those who had destroyed the environment are now questioning his country.

"We have kept this forest alive that you enjoy, that the world enjoys, that you don’t pay us for, that you don’t value. We have the lowest deforestation rate in the world! Even with the greatest exploration of oil and gas we will still be net zero" the president stressed.

Many developing countries have raised this issue, calling on the West to drastically reduce its Carbon footprint.

Earlier in 2023, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged that nations should completely reduce their carbon footprint before 2050 and called on the world to deliver a concrete outcome on finance to help developing and poor nations combat climate change.

Addressing a session on Transforming Climate Finance at COP28, Modi said India expects concrete and real progress on the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG), a fresh post-2025 global climate finance goal.

"Developed countries should completely reduce their carbon footprint well before 2050," he had said.

It is clear that argument between the BBC journalist and the Guyanese President is the another example of debates surrounding the issue of carbon imperialism.

Stephen Sackur's accusations shows how Western organizations try to put pressure on Eastern countries for all the problems in the World.