Pacific Islands Summit Highlights Disproportionate Climate Impacts

As more than 1,500 delegates from over 40 nations gathered in Tonga for the 53rd Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting, climate defenders on Monday urged the world's biggest polluters to do much more to phase out the fossil fuels that are driving a planetary emergency disproportionately affecting low-lying island countries, which are among the world's lowest greenhouse gas emitters.

"Tonga's vision for the 53rd Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting (PIFLM53) is for the Pacific to move beyond policy deliberation to implementation—to achieve transformation by building better now," summit organizers said in a statement affirming the event's mission to "develop collective responses to regional issues and deliver on their vision for a resilient Pacific region of peace, harmony, security, social inclusion, and prosperity."

"We may be small island countries but we are a force to be reckoned with."

Addressing attendees at the summit's opening ceremony in the Tongan capital of Nuku'alofa, Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) Secretary-General Baron Waqa of Nauru called for regional unity to tackle common challenges.

"We may be small island countries but we are a force to be reckoned with," he said. "We are at the center of geostrategic interest, we are at the forefront of a battle against climate change and its impacts."

Speaking at Monday's opening session, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres lamented that "humanity is treating the sea like a sewer. Plastic pollution is choking sea life. Greenhouse gases are causing ocean heating, acidification, and a dramatic and accelerating rise in sea levels."

Guterres—who warned in Samoa last week that low-lying island nations face the threat of climate "annihilation"—said that "Pacific islands are showing the way to protect our climate, our planet, and our ocean: By declaring a climate emergency and pushing for action, and with your declarations on sea-level rise, and aspirations for a just transition to a fossil fuel-free Pacific. But, the region urgently needs substantial finance, capacities, and technology to speed up the transition and to invest in adaptation and resilience."

"The young people of the Pacific have taken the climate crisis all the way to the International Court of Justice," Guterres added. "You have also rightly recognized that this is a security crisis—and taken steps to manage those risks together."

Mahoney Mori, who chairs the Pacific Youth Council and is the PIFLM53 youth representative from the Federated States of Micronesia, called out the international community's failure to adequately fund climate mitigation initiatives like the loss and damage fund—which developing nations say will require an annual investment of at least $400 billion, or nearly 10 times the amount pledged at last year's United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai.

"Despite the commendable pledges from the United Nations and world leaders such as the Paris agreement, the existing global finance mechanisms still hindered community-based and youth organizations from accessing critical support," Mori said. "The Pacific's grassroots organizations struggle to meet global standards amidst this crisis and time is running out."

As leaders met for PIFLM53 amid torrential rains, a 6.9-magnitude earthquake rocked Tonga's main island of Tongatapu. While there was no damage reported and no tsunami warning issued, summit attendees said the temblor underscored vulnerabilities faced by low-lying island nations.

Leaders and activists from Pacific island nations took aim at regional giant Australia—which has been perennially ranked as one of the world's worst climate-wreckers in U.N.-backed Sustainable Development reports—for insufficient climate action.

"We recognize Australia's desire to present itself as a climate leader and co-host the COP alongside the Pacific," Pacific Islands Climate Action Network regional director Rufino Varea said in a statement, referring to Australia's bid to help lead the 2026 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP31.

"However, true leadership must not merely be aspirational; it must be actionable," Varea continued. "To date, Australia has expanded gas production instead of aligning its practices with the urgent needs of the Pacific. This does not reflect the leadership we need."

"If Australia is to demonstrate genuine commitment, it must align its domestic and international climate policies with our goals and advocate earnestly for a fossil fuel-free Pacific," he stressed. "It must also commit to ambitious climate actions, ensure effective climate finance is delivered to Pacific island countries, and contribute substantially to the loss and damage fund."

"If these steps are not taken, we risk witnessing a COP that concedes failure—declaring that critical targets were missed, and that Pacific communities continue to be exploited as mere labor resources for the enrichment of others," Varea added.