Bob Geldof warns millennials have ‘blood stained hands’ following Paris attacks: ‘Those people were killed by people of your generation’

Geldof warns younger generation is failing in preventing more devastating global wars breaking out

Bob Geldof has issued a stark warning to millennials as the conflict in the Middle East rages and terror attacks blight Europe.

Geldof accused the generation that followed him of having blood on its hands when he took to the stage at the One Young World conference in Bangkok, Thailand on Wednesday.

The Boomtown Rats singer has been an outspoken campaigner for refugees and has forcefully criticised governments in the West for failing to do more to ease the crisis. He reacted to the growing unrest in the Middle East and the massacre that took place in Paris over the weekend with a sombre message for young people about the responsibility they now face.

“This generation, your generation, is already stained with blood. Your age group are the killers of Syria. The people your age are murdering people in Beirut, Sharm el Sheikh. And most immediately in our minds right now, those people who went to a pop concert in Paris, who tried to watch a football match, who went out with their girlfriends or their parents for a drink or a coffee, those people were killed by people of your generation.

He said this was in part due to the failures of his generation, who are now virtually helpless to repair the damage he claims they caused. Geldof urged millennials to put aside belief and emotion in the aftermath of recent terror attacks and criticised young people for not using tools available to them after the advancement in technology to make a real difference.

He continued: “Us old men, we too listened to old men speak to us, that we were the glowing future. It’s a cliche - you are the present.

"We [the older generation] can't do much anymore but the reason we speak to you is because we are desperate to retract our failures. Stop with the belief, stop with emotion. The flags are cute - but nothing else.

"What is required of this unique conference, what is demanded by the old guys is thinking. That’s not enough. What is required of course is tolerance, love and understanding. What is ultimately necessary to be understood is empathy. And you're failing. We just might be getting to that critical point of 100 and 200 years ago. Of 1815 at the culmination of a vast , murderous global war.

“Your century hasn’t begun but we gave you the idea of this century. We gave you the mechanism and technology of this century. Right now it is being used for triviality, or seriousness in killing, but not seriousness in thought.

"You are the serious generation. Forget the tweeting that's about bullshit. Tweet about serious things. Go back to your countries, get real with your governments, get the people of your age group to understand precisely what happens. Stop with violence, it doesn't work. Come back to your country and take action. [...] Now we've got the thinking planet here, already a failure to your name, your killers, killing other people, innocent, of your age group. Shame on you. Wipe out that shame. You've got time. It's get real time."