“We are bringing a message of love, of peace, of continuing”

As the COP21 climate negotiations go down to the wire in Paris tonight, the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said the talks have been the most complicated and difficult he has ever been involved in.

As the diplomats and politicians from 200 nations fight over the text word by word and line by line, it is increasingly clear there are serious flaws to any agreement.

One of the exclusions will concern the rights of the world’s indigenous communities, many of whom have been at the forefront of recent climate victories such as the stopping of the Keystone XL pipeline and kicking Shell Out of the Arctic.

As I write, the Indigenous Environmental Movement has invited First Nations from across the globe, from North and South America, from the Arctic to the South Pacific, to gather at the base of the iconic Eiffel Tower to hold a powerful and poignant water ceremony.

“The message we are bringing with this action is a message of love, of peace, of continuing”, says Patricia Gualinga, a Kichwa leader from the Ecuadorian Amazon.