Tawakkol Karman's speech – One Young World Summit - Munich
Dear friends,
My beloved changemakers,
You are not only the leaders of tomorrow —
you are the leaders of now.
For centuries, humanity was ruled by those who believed power was their inheritance.
But now, in this generation, power is no longer inherited — it is created.
Created by conscience, courage, knowledge, and compassion.
This is the age where leadership is not measured by armies, wealth, or titles,
but by the ability to heal, to build, to unite, and to to create change.
You have gathered here not to celebrate the world as it is,
but to lead the world as it must become.
Today, We stand at a turning point unlike any before.
“The earth is burning, democracy is bleeding, truth is drowning in oceans of lies, and social and economic justice are vanishing before the greed of superpower nations and corporations that have forgotten their duties and their compassion.”
But also today, in the middle of this storm stands you —
the generation that refuses to surrender.
You are the first generation in history to inherit both the tools and wisdom to save the world.
The question is not what the tools you own it can do —
but what you will do with them. And you will do a lot!
I have seen what youth can do.
I have seen revolutions born from classrooms, universities, and cafes.
I have seen dictators fall because young men and women refused to bow to fear.
Business Leaders:
Build Economies With compotation, Business without ethics becomes destruction.
Profit matters, But great and noble matters more.
We no longer live in a time where success is measured only by wealth.
Real success is measured by impact:
• How many jobs did you create? How many communities did you uplift? How much dignity did you protect? How much hope did you spark?
• We should not build a prosperous economy on broken dignity or stolen rights.
• No nation should grow rich by draining the lifeblood of another.
No economy should thrive on inequality.
No future should build on stolen land and stolen dreams.
• No more wealth built on the suffering of others.
• Let us build a world where economic power does not come from exploitation,
but from innovation, fairness, and respect for every human being —
from the Amazon to Africa, from Yemen to Sudan, from Palestine to every Indigenous land that still carries the scars of colonization.
• We must stand against the exploitation of poor nations,
against the theft of natural resources,
against powerful corporations and governments who take minerals, energy, land, and labor from vulnerable communities —
and return only pollution, poverty, and promises.
• Justice for Indigenous people is justice for humanity.
And if we truly want to protect this planet, we must learn from those who have protected it longest.
Be the generation that ends corruption instead of complaining about it.
Build companies that treat workers, refugees, women, and youth not as numbers, but as partners in humanity.
Dear friends
We cannot speak about future leadership without speaking about moral duty.
To be silent in front of genocide is to betray humanity.
To ignore occupation, apartheid, racism, fascism — is to surrender the world to darkness.
Stand with Gaza.
Stand with Sudan.
Stand with every oppressed soul in Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, Ukraine, everywhere.
Stand not because they are Arab or African or Muslim or Christian —
stand because they are human.
The struggle for freedom is one struggle.
Across nations, across cultures, across religions —
Human dignity has one language.
Peace is not the absence of war.
Peace is the presence of justice.
And justice will not come from governments alone —
it will come from people like you refusing to accept oppression as normal
And here, in Germany — a nation that rebuilt itself from the ruins of war, a nation that opened its doors to millions seeking safety — I speak with deep respect and honest candor:
Germany once said “Nie wieder — Never again.”
It said it before the ruins of Nazism, before the blood of innocents — as a promise that hate, racism, and genocide would never return.
But today, that promise must be renewed — not only in Europe, but in Gaza, in Palestine, and everywhere people suffer from tyranny and injustice.
Migration is not a crisis.
It is a human story.
It is courage, not crime.
It is resilience, not threat.
And when we speak of migration and refugees,
let us tell the full truth — not the political version, but the moral one.
People do not leave their homes because they want to abandon their land, their memories, their language, their childhood streets.
They leave because forces larger than them pushed them out.
They leave because:
• Colonialism carved borders with blood and left nations in chaos,
• Corporations extracted wealth from Africa, Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East and left poverty behind,
• Superpowers waged wars, supported dictators, fueled coups, and turned peaceful countries into battlefields,
• Global powers exploited minerals, oil, gold, lithium, and land — and returned only conflict, corruption, and displacement.
Let us be honest:
The world that complains about refugees is often the same world that created the conditions that forced them to flee.
If we care about stopping migration,
we must stop the causes.
We must stop wars, stop exploitation, stop dictatorship, stop resource theft, stop global hypocrisy.
Refugees are not the failure —
the failure is the world that made them refugees.
Let us reject the voices that weaponize fear,
that describe refugees as burdens,
that use migrants as political tools,
that stoke Islamophobia, Xenophobia and racism to win votes and divide communities.
Dear Young people:
• Create boldly
• Build ethically
• Speak truth fearlessly
• Protect freedom relentlessly
