NEW YORK (AP) Teenage Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg was named Times youngest ever person of the year today.
Thunberg, 16, has become the face of the youth climate movement, drawing large crowds with her appearances at protests and conferences over the past year and a half. Some have welcomed her activism, including her speeches challenging world leaders to do more to stop global warming. But others have criticized her sometimes combative tone.
For sounding the alarm about humanitys predatory relationship with the only home we have, for bringing to a fragmented world a voice that transcends backgrounds and borders, for showing us all what it might look like when a new generation leads, Greta Thunberg is TIMEs 2019 Person of the Year, the media franchise said today on its website.
Thunberg was in Madrid today, where she addressed negotiators at the U.N.s COP25 climate talks.
Last years Time winners included slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi; the staff of the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland, where five people were shot to death; Philippine journalist Maria Ressa; and two Reuters journalists, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo.
