CARICOM Leaders Tell COP 21.
WILL the English Speaking Caribbean achieve its goal of getting the rest of the world to cap world’s temperature rise at 1.5 degrees Celsius?
Regional leaders attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21) that opened last Monday in Paris, France know that the agenda they are carrying through in this conference is a tough one, but they are hopeful and united in their quest.
“We’re very hopeful, it’s a negotiation. We are here with the capacity to negotiate and the determination to succeed,” CARICOM’s Secretary-General (Executive Director), Ambassador Irwin La Rocque said.
And while there are countries that are hostile to CARICOM’s agenda, there are others supporting them, including the United States of America, a fact noted by Saint Lucia’s Prime Minister, Dr. Kenny Anthony who, earlier this week in Paris, said that the USA openly championed and shared the concerns of Small Island Developing States.
“These negotiations will be very intense and complex but I believe there are important signals and there are opportunities,” Dr. Anthony said, adding that the unity of the small island states at the conference will be crucial if they are to achieve anything in Paris.
“Internally we have to be coherent, cohesive and focussed. It is very important that we hold on to the principles that matter to us even though we are flexible in the negotiating process,” Dr. Anthony said.
The region has a very strong contingent of political leaders and technocrats at the conference because of the importance of the talks to the region.
Ambassador La Rocque and Bahamas Prime Minister, Perry Christie, outlined the importance of the conference to the region stating that the Bahamas and other Small Island Developing States are seeing unprecedented droughts and extreme weather events, and other life threatening climatic occurrences impacting on the countries in the region.
Saint Lucia in 2010 experienced Hurricane Tomas that took about seven lives and caused damage to the country amounting to almost $1 billion. This was followed three years later by a Christmas Eve trough that caused severe damage to the country’s infrastructure, destroying homes, downing power lines, carrying away bridges, destroying a significant portion of the country’s agriculture and taking human lives in the process.
Since then and including last month, there have been several weather systems that have caused severe pain and damage throughout Saint Lucia.
Prime Minister Christie emphasized the dangers to climate change the small island states in the region will face by stating that “with 80 percent of our land within one metre or five feet of mean sea level, business as usual with regard to climate change threatens the very existence of the Bahamas as we know it.”
His experience with hurricane Joaquin this year, which caused much damage to some of the islands of the Bahamas prompted him to state that climate change threatens the very existence of small island states in the region.
Ambassador La Rocque shares similar sentiments stating that “we must address the situation as it already has begun to impact on the region”.
“Already one of the critical issues facing us is that of global warming. We are currently experiencing severe climatic events in our region so we know that climate change is upon us. We certainly cannot leave here without some sort of indication, some setting of the goal of achieving 1.5 degrees for the continued survival of our region,” La Rocque said.
One hundred and fifty world leaders attended the opening of COP21 Monday. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon called on the leaders to write a script for a new future of hope and promise and prosperity for all.
“You are here today to write a script for a new future; a future of hope and promise, of increased prosperity, security and dignity for all,” he said in his opening address.
“The science has made it plainly clear even a two degrees Celsius rise will have serious consequences for food and water security, economic stability and international peace and security. That is why we need a universal, meaningful and robust agreement here in Paris,” Moon added.
While La Rocgue and Anthony are confident that they could negotiate a cap of 1.5 degrees Celsius in Paris and see this through in the agreement that will come out of the negotiations, they are not stopping there.
According to La Rocque CARICOM is negotiating in all the realms available at those talks.
“We would like to see reflected in this agreement the recognition of the principle of loss and damage which is to be addressed moving forward. Special circumstances of small island developing states must also be reflected within the context of an agreement coming out of Paris” he said.
La Rocque called for transparency in the commitments countries would make to the agreement hoping that the commitments to provide financing made by developed countries would be honoured by them.
“And I dare add that such commitments to provide financing should not be tied up in bureaucratic manoeuverings,” he said.
La Rocque is of the view that the vulnerabilities exhibited by small island states should be a major criteria for accessing the resources pledged by the developed countries.
“This is something we would not like to see at all. We are dead against that. The assistance must be provided on the basis of our vulnerability,” La Rocque said.
