As international public concern over the increasingly dire climate crisis grows, most notably among the world's youth, a key United Nations climate change conference kicks off in Madrid on Monday.
For Japan, the conference will be used as an opportunity to promote cutting-edge environmental technologies and explain its reasons for continuing to rely on fossil fuel energy, including coal, in the coming years even as calls domestically and abroad to stop all use of coal grow stronger.
The annual meeting of U.N. delegates to discuss ways to reduce greenhouse gases takes place just days after a worldwide climate strike march by the youth-led movement Fridays for Future at 3,000 different locations worldwide Friday, which called for stronger, quicker measures to deal with the climate change.