This ceremony was intended by the Icelandic authorities as a way to warn about the consequences of climate change.

As a symbol to attract attention, Iceland will unveil Sunday a plaque in memory of Okjökull, the first glacier on the island to have lost its status, engulfed by the warming, the opportunity for scientists to warn about the consequences of climate change. The commemorative plaque is due to open around 2 pm on the site of the former Okjökull (literally "Ok glacier" in Icelandic) in the west of the island.

Icelandic Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir and former United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson are expected to attend the ceremony. "This will be the first monument erected in honor of a glacier that has disappeared because of global climate change," said Cymene Howe, a professor of anthropology at Rice University in the United States, in July. the initiative of the project.

With this plaque in gold letters titled in Icelandic and English "A letter for the future", the researchers hope to raise awareness of the decline of glaciers and the effects of climate change. The plate also bears the mention "415 ppm CO2", in reference to the record level of carbon dioxide concentration recorded in the atmosphere last May.

400 glaciers threatened with extinction

"By commemorating a fallen glacier, we want to focus on what is disappearing - or dying - around the world, and drawing attention to the fact that it is something that has been 'done' by men, although we should not be proud of it, "explains Cymene Howe, quoted in a statement. "Discussions on climate change can be very abstract, accompanied by many catastrophic statistics and complex scientific models (...) incomprehensible," she adds.

Thus, says the professor, "a monument to the memory of a disappeared glacier may be a good way to understand what we are facing today". According to the researcher and her colleague Dominic Boyer, Iceland loses about eleven billion tons of ice every year. Scientists are worried about the disappearance of some 400 glaciers on subarctic island within 200 years.