SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
pacific islands
Nearly a Third of Tuvalu Residents Seek Climate Visas to Australia as Sea Engulfs Their Home
Scientists say the Pacific island nation will likely be uninhabitable by 2100.
Jun 26, 2025
With more than three weeks to go until the deadline for citizens of Tuvalu to apply for a limited number of visas as part of an agreement with Australia, nearly a third of people in the tiny Pacific island nation had registered by Thursday in hopes of emigrating from one of the world's most climate-vulnerable countries.
After a 2024 climate migration pact between the two nations, the Falepili Union, citizens of Tuvalu are eligible to apply for 280 Australian visas that will be given out each year.
Registration for the inaugural visas began last week, and within four days, 3,125 Tuvaluans had entered a lottery to win one. Tuvalu is home to about 10,643 people, according to 2022 census figures.
The Falepili Union was agreed to two years after leaders from Tuvalu proposed a fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty at the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, making it the second Pacific island nation to demand an international agreement to stop the extraction of the planet-heating fossil fuels that have made Tuvalu one of the world's most vulnerable countries to the climate emergency.
Scientists say Tuvalu, which includes nine low-lying islands and atolls, could be uninhabitable by the end of the century due to rising sea levels.
The islands also see an average of one tropical cyclone in their vicinity per year, with storms often hitting in quick succession and exposing homes and other structures to high winds and extreme rainfall. The nation's gross domestic product fell by more than 25% in 2015 due to Cyclone Pam, which temporarily displaced 45% of the population, contaminated drinking water, and killed livestock. Due to the impact on agriculture across several Pacific Islands, roughly 166,000 people needed immediate food aid in the aftermath of the storm.
Two of the country's coral atolls have mostly been lost to sea-level rise, making the islands more vulnerable to storms.
By 2100, sea levels are projected to rise by more than two feet and Tuvalu is expected to face flooding for nearly a third of every year.
A spokesperson for Australia's Foreign Affairs Department told The Guardian that the Falepili Union is "the first agreement of its kind anywhere in the world, providing a pathway for mobility with dignity as climate impacts worsen."
Tuvaluans who obtain Australian visas under the pact will be eligible for Medicare, disability insurance, family tax benefits, childcare subsidies, and other benefits.
Earlier this month, Tuvalu was included in a draft list of countries where the Trump administration was considering imposing travel bans, in an internal cable sent by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The administration said Tuvalu's inclusion was a mistake.
The pact with Australia commits the Australian government to defending Tuvalu from military aggression and health pandemics as well as "natural disasters."
"For the first time," Tuvaluan Prime Minister Feleti Teo said when the agreement was signed, "there is a country that has committed legally to recognize the future statehood and sovereignty of Tuvalu despite the detrimental impact of climate change-induced sea-level rise."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Biden Administration Takes 'Morally Bankrupt' Climate Position at ICJ
"This opposition to strong international law on climate justice categorically undermines the Biden administration's climate legacy," said Ashfaq Khalfan of Oxfam America.
Dec 05, 2024
The Biden administration faced backlash from scientists, advocacy groups, and vulnerable Pacific islands on Wednesday for arguing before the United Nations' highest court that the Paris agreement is sufficient and countries should not face additional legal obligations to fight the climate emergency.
The U.S. position, outlined at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) by State Department legal adviser Margaret Taylor, was deemed "morally bankrupt" by Oxfam America, which
decried the administration's insistence that "countries do not have clear legal obligations to reduce carbon pollution, especially as it prepares to turn over the executive office to a proven climate denier like President-elect [Donald] Trump."
"This opposition to strong international law on climate justice categorically undermines the Biden administration's climate legacy," Ashfaq Khalfan, Oxfam America's climate justice director, said Wednesday. "The U.S. has today denied any firm obligation to reduce carbon pollution to safer levels, phase out fossil fuel production, or provide funding to lower-income countries to help with renewable energy and protection from climate harms. Governments have failed to do what is necessary to protect humanity from the climate crisis, and it is essential that the ICJ holds them to account by pushing them towards concrete action to ensure climate justice."
Taylor argued during her presentation in The Hague on Wednesday that "the U.N. climate change regime, with the Paris agreement at its core, is the only international legal regime specifically designed by states to address climate change" and that "cooperative efforts through that regime provide the best hope for protecting the climate system for the benefit of present and future generations."
While technically a legally binding international treaty, the Paris accord has failed to arrest the rise of planet-warming carbon emissions, which have surged to an all-time high this year. The agreement—from which the U.S. is expected to withdraw for a second time under Trump—has no enforcement mechanism, and its language leaves ample room for countries to continue burning fossil fuels at levels that scientists say are incompatible with a livable future.
"The U.S. is content with its business-as-usual approach and has taken every possible measure to shirk its historical responsibility, disregard human rights, and reject climate justice."
Delta Merner, lead scientist for the Science Hub for Climate Litigation at the Union of Concerned Scientists, criticized the U.S.—the largest historical polluter—for resisting "calls for climate accountability" at Wednesday's ICJ hearing.
"Instead of taking responsibility for its contributions to the climate crisis, the United States used its 30-minute slot to downplay the role of the courts for global climate action, emphasize nonbinding national commitments under the Paris agreement, and reject the notion of historical responsibility," said Merner. "By framing climate change as a collective action challenge without clear legal obligations for individual states, the United States dismissed the potential for redress or binding accountability measures that advance justice for climate-vulnerable nations."
"In the face of stonewalling from major polluters, we applaud the leadership of Vanuatu and others for advancing this process," Merner added. "These proceedings must continue to center the voices of frontline communities."
The Pacific island of Vanuatu first launched the push for an ICJ advisory opinion on climate in 2021. Less than two years later, the U.N. General Assembly approved a resolution calling on the ICJ to issue an opinion on countries' legal obligations regarding the global fight against climate change.
Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu's special envoy for climate change and environment,
criticized the U.S. presentation at Wednesday's landmark hearing and said treaties such as the Paris agreement can't be "a veil for inaction or a substitute for legal accountability."
"These nations—some of the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters—have pointed to existing treaties and commitments that have regrettably failed to motivate substantial reductions in emissions," said Regenvanu. "There needs to be an accounting for the failure to curb emissions and the climate change impacts and human rights violations that failure has generated."
Vishal Prasad, director of Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change, expressed outrage at what he described as "a disheartening attempt by the U.S. to evade its responsibilities as one of the world's largest polluters."
"The U.S. is content with its business-as-usual approach and has taken every possible measure to shirk its historical responsibility, disregard human rights, and reject climate justice," Prasad added.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Pacific Islands Push ICC to Recognize Ecocide as International Crime
"This is a moment of generational change, one that is needed to safeguard our environment and signal to coming generations that the world is truly serious about doing so," said one legal expert on ecocide.
Sep 10, 2024
Campaigners against ecocide, the destruction of nature, applauded what one leader called a "key moment" in the fight to protect the natural world and communities that are most vulnerable to climate damage on Monday as three Pacific island nations proposed that the International Criminal Court formally recognize the crime.
Vanuatu, which first made a similar proposal in 2019, was joined by Samoa and Fiji in submitting the proposal to the ICC, which was established in 2002 to prosecute cases regarding genocide and crimes against humanity.
"Vanuatu considers it imperative that the international community takes this conversation seriously, and we warmly invite all member states to engage," said Ralph Regenvanu, special envoy for climate change and environment for Vanuatu, in a statement. "Legal recognition of severe and widespread environmental harm holds significant potential to ensure justice and, crucially, to deter further destruction."
The recognition of environmental and ecosystem destruction as a crime could allow the court to prosecute individuals accused of ecocide, such executives of pollution-causing companies whose activities are linked to planetary heating and the sea-level rise and intense storms small island nations increasingly face and officials of governments that continue to emit high levels of greenhouse gases.
Philippe Sands, a law professor at University College London and co-chair of an expert panel on the legal definition of ecocide, said that as drafted, the Rome Statute, which established the ICC, "cannot adequately address environmental harms" and must be changed to reflect "a growing recognition that severe environmental destruction deserves the same legal accountability as other grave international crimes that focus on the human."
"People clearly understand that the most severe forms of environmental destruction harm all of us, and that there is real deterrent potential in creating personal criminal liability for top decision-makers."
“There is a manifest gap in the statute of the ICC, and ecocide is now firmly on the agenda, a vital and necessary moment for an effective international law," said Sands. "This is a moment of generational change, one that is needed to safeguard our environment and signal to coming generations that the world is truly serious about doing so."
Sands told The Guardian that he is "100% certain" that ecocide will ultimately be recognized as an international crime, but with the matter tabled for a full discussion by the ICC at a later date, a long deliberation process is expected.
The Pacific nations introduced the proposal at the ICC days after the Global Commons Survey, conducted by Ipsos UK, found that 72% of people in G20 countries believe ecocide should be recognized as a crime.
Jojo Mehta, co-founder and CEO of Stop Ecocide International, said last week that "widespread civil society demand" has driven the European Union to recognize "conduct comparable to ecocide" as a "qualified" offense, and Belgium to adopt ecocide as a crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison and fines as high as $1.8 million.
"We're seeing significant policy shifts in favor of ecocide legislation at the domestic, regional, and international levels," said Mehta. "People clearly understand that the most severe forms of environmental destruction harm all of us, and that there is real deterrent potential in creating personal criminal liability for top decision-makers. Damage prevention is always the best policy, which is precisely what ecocide law is about."
Some of the world's biggest polluters, including the United States, China, and Russia, are not member states of the ICC, and could challenge the court's jurisdiction if accused of ecocide—but Mehta said Monday that "by establishing legal consequences, we create a guardrail that compels decision-makers to prioritize safety for people and planet, fundamentally altering how they approach their obligations."
"We also create a route to justice for the worst harms," she said, "whether they occur in times of conflict or in times of peace."
Regenvanu said Vanuatu has prioritized the recognition of ecocide as a crime after suffering significant climate damage for years, with the government already having relocated six towns due to irreversible sea level rise.
"Environmental and climate loss and damage in Vanuatu is devastating our island economy, submerging our territory, and threatening livelihoods. This tragedy is not unique to Vanuatu but is shared by many small island nations that, despite bearing the least responsibility for the crisis, suffer most from its impacts," said Regenvanu. "We urge ICC member states to take note of the very substantial civil society support for this initiative around the world as it moves forward in this crucial discussion."
Keep ReadingShow Less
In Samoa, UN Chief Says Low-Lying Island Nations Face 'Annihilation' by Climate Chaos
"We need all countries to honor their promises on climate finance and a strong finance outcome from this year's COP where we will discuss the financial commitments after 2025."
Aug 22, 2024
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned in Samoa on Thursday that low-lying Pacific island nations face the threat of "annihilation" from rising sea levels, cyclones, ocean heatwaves, and other dangers driven by human-caused climate chaos.
"High and rising sea levels pose an enormous threat to Samoa, to the Pacific, and to other small island developing states. These challenges demand resolute international action," Guterres said. "Sea levels are rising even faster than the global average, posing an existential threat to millions of Pacific Islanders."
"If we are not able to stop what is happening with climate change, this problem that we see in Samoa will not stay in Samoa."
Recalling the 2009 earthquake and tsunami that killed at least 192 people and devastated Samoa, Guterres said that "we have seen people that moved their houses inland, we have seen people that persisted coming back and rebuilding, we have seen an enormous determination of people to fight against, not only the impact of the tsunami, but the impacts of the rising sea levels and of the storms and the cyclones."
"I've seen a wall that is protecting a village from the sea; that wall in 20 years, because of the tsunami—because of the rising sea level, and because of the heavy storms—has already been built three times," he continued.
"People are suffering. Economies are being shattered. And entire territories face annihilation," Guterres stressed.
Guterres said Samoans' ambitious plans to tackle the "existential threat for millions" are being impeded by a lack of promised funding from rich nations. He pointed to the Loss and Damage Fund, agreed to in 2022 at the U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP27) in Egypt, as well as rich countries' 2021 pledge to double climate adaptation funding to $200 billion.
"We are fighting hard for climate justice," said Guterres, but "we are not seeing the money that is needed and that's why we ask for the reform and the international financial institutions in order for the funding needs of countries, like Pacific countries, to be met."
"We need all countries to honor their promises on climate finance and a strong finance outcome from this year's COP where we will discuss the financial commitments after 2025," he added.
COP29—which has been criticized by green groups for being chaired by a former oil executive—is set to take place in Baku, Azerbaijan in November.
Low-lying Pacific island nations are among the least responsible for the climate emergency but are among the most adversely affected by the crisis. To help address this, Guterres reiterated his call for small island nations like Samoa to have access to $80 billion in development from special drawing rights (SDRs), which are reserve assets controlled by the International Monetary Fund that can be exchanged for cash. Rich countries can also place SDRs in a fund for developing nations' use.
The secretary-general also said that new income streams are key to the survival of nations like Samoa whose tourism industries were devastated by the Covid-19 pandemic and which "have not received the support of the international community."
"If we are not able to stop what is happening with climate change, this problem that we see in Samoa will not stay in Samoa," Guterres warned. "It will be happening more and more everywhere in all coastal areas, from New York to Shanghai, from Lagos to Bangkok."
Keep ReadingShow Less
What's at Stake Is Our Survival
We are signing a death sentence if we continue to rely on fossil fuels.
Dec 12, 2023
Pacific nations have a reputation for being climate champions.
The resilience and commitment of Pacific negotiators and communities are to thank for the many landmark outcomes from previous UN climate talks, known as the Convention of the Parties or COP, including the Paris Agreement commitment to stay below 1.5 degrees of global heating, as well as the Loss and Damage fund.
COP28 in Dubai was no different: the Pacific showed up, as always, fighting for solutions. Now, a few hours until the close of the summit, the big questions still remain, but not on our shoulders: are we going back home to our communities feeling supported by world leaders and with hope that our heritage and land will survive the climate crisis?
Once again, the rich in the Global North have callously undermined the momentum in the Global South.
This was the largest COP in history, with record numbers of delegates and the largest presence of fossil fuel lobbyists on record: 2,456 industry lobbyists in all which is more than the total delegates from the 10 most climate-vulnerable countries combined. It's not a surprise that private interests have influenced decision-makers. Conference negotiators have allowed the perpetrators of the crisis to rewrite the rules by allowing them to sit at the negotiating table. How could this not have a catastrophic outcome?
Yesterday, a disappointing draft of this year's Global Stocktake review and agreement for the years to come failed to mention the phase-out of fossil energy sources. The science is clear, no matter how much the fossil fuel industry pushes for unproven technologies, like Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), they are still very far from real scalability and economic feasibility. We are signing a death sentence if we continue to rely on fossil fuels.
Actually, let me rephrase it: countries like mine will be signing a death sentence, as we are often the ones at the forefront of climate chaos, while those that have the biggest responsibilities in polluting the world hide behind their profits. And when I say hide behind their profits, I mean it. It is not news that the global energy and financial systems carry a heritage of colonialism, extractivism, and bias against the world's poorest communities. Not only did the draft text fail to demand a fossil fuel phaseout, it also made virtually no commitments on mitigation, adaptation, and financial support for renewable energy in the Global South.
Facing the catastrophic effects of extreme weather at home and watching the slow progress of the negotiations, it was hard not to be pessimistic before we even arrived at COP28.
Once again, the rich in the Global North have callously undermined the momentum in the Global South.
Every year, we travel across oceans to come to these negotiations and we continue to get only drops of ambition. Facing the catastrophic effects of extreme weather at home and watching the slow progress of the negotiations, it was hard not to be pessimistic before we even arrived at COP28. But the point is that we can't afford not to be here, we can't afford to stop fighting because what's at stake is our very survival.
So we will return home, and continue to build up resilience in our communities, adapt and transition our energy systems, and rely on the strength of the people at the forefront of climate change. But it is now evident that we will do so without the support of global political leaders.
Keep ReadingShow Less
What's the US Empire Doing Way Out in the Pacific Ocean Anyway?
There is no legal basis for the United States to control the large oceanic area that includes the compact states.
Sep 20, 2023
In defiance of international norms and rules, U.S. officials are laying claim to the large oceanic area in the central Pacific Ocean that is home to the compact states.
Now that they are renewing the economic provisions of the compacts of free association with Palau, the Marshall Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia, U.S. officials are insisting that the compacts provide the United States with exclusive control over an area of the central Pacific Ocean that is comparable in size to the United States.
“We control essentially the northern half of the Pacific between Hawaii and Philippines,” U.S. special envoy Joseph Yun told Congress in July.
For decades, the United States has overseen compacts of free association with Palau, the Marshall Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia. Under the compacts, the United States provides the three countries with economic assistance while it maintains powerful military controls over the islands and their waters.
One of these military controls, “the defense veto,” enables the United States to prevent the compact states from forging international agreements that could impede U.S. military priorities. Consequently, the compact states have never joined the Treaty of Rarotonga, which established a nuclear-free zone in the region.
Another U.S. military control is “the right of strategic denial” by which U.S. officials assert that they can prevent other countries from accessing the compact states’ lands, waters, and airspace.
“The compacts do give us full defense authority and responsibility in those countries and provide our ability to strategically deny third country military access,” U.S. diplomat Jane Bocklage told Congress earlier this year.
By claiming to have a right of strategic denial over the compact states’ exclusive economic zones... U.S. officials are taking a position that is inconsistent with international law and their own practices in many parts of the world, including the Indo-Pacific.
Although the compacts include language that permits the United States to foreclose access to the islands by third-party military forces, U.S. officials have broadly interpreted this language to mean that they can exclude third parties from the compact states’ exclusive economic zones (EEZs), which extend up to 200 miles around each island’s coastlines.
At a congressional hearing in July, Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) asserted that strategic denial authority “allows us to deny access to any potential adversary in an area of the Pacific comparable in size to the continental United States.” An associate presented a map that portrayed the EEZs as one contiguous area under U.S. control. “It’s nearly as large as the continental United States,” Barrasso remarked.
Defense Department official Siddharth Mohandas agreed with the senator’s interpretation. He claimed that the United States maintains unfettered and exclusive access to the area. “We have the ability to deny foreign militaries access and the ability to operate in the exclusive economic zones of the Freely Associated States,” Mohandas said, referring to the compact states.
This interpretation of strategic denial is inconsistent with international law. Under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, all countries have the rights of navigation and overflight in the exclusive economic zones of other countries, as stipulated by Articles 58 and 87.
Most countries, including the compact states, are parties to the convention. The United States has never ratified the convention, but high-level U.S. officials have expressed their support for it.
“Although not yet a party to the treaty, the U.S. nevertheless observes the UN LOSC as reflective of customary international law and practice,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration explains, referring to the Convention on the Law of the Sea.
When U.S. officials say that they have a right to exclude third-party actors from the compact states’ exclusive economic zones, they are making claims that are inconsistent with the UN Convention. There is no legal basis for the United States to prevent ships from other countries from peacefully traversing the compact states’ exclusive economic zones.
More than two decades ago, the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) acknowledged in a major report that strategic denial does not extend to the compact states’ exclusive economic zones. According to the GAO report, strategic denial is limited to the 12-mile territorial waters that surround each island. Even within these smaller zones, the GAO noted, military vessels from other countries maintain the right of “innocent passage.”
“Statements by policymakers that indicate the United States has a right to deny military access to the islands and a vast area of the Pacific Ocean—a widely cited U.S. interest—overstate the breadth of this right, which only covers the individual islands and their 12-mile territorial waters,” the GAO explained.
A map included in the GAO report shows that strategic denial applies to small isolated areas rather than the much larger expanse of the Pacific Ocean that is often claimed by U.S. officials. A key implication of the GAO’s map is that the United States cannot legally exclude third parties from the vast oceanic area that surrounds the compact states.
In fact, U.S. officials have long taken the position that exclusive economic zones must remain open to navigation. Across the world, they have promoted “freedom of navigation,” which they have presented as the freedom of ships to sail the world’s oceans and waterways wherever the law allows, including in the exclusive economic zones of other countries.
When U.S. officials have sent warships through some of the world’s most contested waterways, such as the South and East China Seas, they have said that they are defending “freedom of navigation.” The presence of U.S. military forces has often created tensions, possibly even violating Article 88 of the U.N. Convention, which requires ships to have peaceful purposes, but U.S. officials have always insisted that these operations are consistent with international law.
“We’re committed to ensuring that every country can fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a speech in June. “Every country, large and small, must remain free to conduct lawful maritime activities.”
The U.S. mass media has often sided with the U.S. government’s position on freedom of navigation, especially as it concerns U.S. military operations in the exclusive economic zones of rival countries. In a July 2023 report about North Korean criticisms of U.S. military activities in North Korea’s exclusive economic zone, The New York Times indicated that North Korea has no legal basis for excluding U.S. military forces from the area.
“A country can claim the right to exploit marine resources in its so-called exclusive economic zone, which extends 200 nautical miles from its 12 nautical-mile territorial waters,” The New York Times reported. “But it does not hold sovereignty over the zone’s surface and the airspace above it.”
When countries such as China and North Korea claim that they have the right to regulate foreign military activities in their exclusive economic zones, U.S. officials always disagree, insisting that these areas must remain open to freedom of navigation, particularly for U.S. warships.
Regarding coastal states such as China and North Korea, the U.S. position is that they “do not have the right to regulate foreign military activities in their EEZs,” according to a report by the Congressional Research Service. “The United States will continue to operate its military ships in the EEZs of other countries.”
By claiming to have a right of strategic denial over the compact states’ exclusive economic zones, however, U.S. officials are taking a position that is inconsistent with international law and their own practices in many parts of the world, including the Indo-Pacific. If they were to use force to prevent a third party from accessing the vast expanse of waters around the compact states, then they would be violating the law and the very principles that they apply to other countries.
In short, U.S. officials have no legal basis for their claims to control the vast oceanic area that is home to the compact states, just as the GAO confirmed in its landmark report more than two decades ago.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Fiji Joins Call for Global Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty at UN Climate Talks
"The time for bold, ambitious, and transformative measures is now," said a representative of the Fijian government.
Jun 13, 2023
Fiji on Monday became the latest country to speak out on the world's stage for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty.
The country had already joined with five other Pacific island nations in backing the treaty at a summit in Port Vila, Vanuatu, in March. Now, it raised its voice to call for a global treaty to phase out fossil fuels at a side event at the ongoing U.N. Climate Change Conference in Bonn, Germany.
"We cannot afford to delay action any longer. Our climate is radically changing, and with it, our ecosystems, our livelihoods, and our cultures all come under increasing threat," Genevieve Jiva, the principal international relations officer for the government of Fiji, said at the conference. "The time for bold, ambitious, and transformative measures is now."
The 14 Pacific Island Developing States are responsible for only 0.23% of global greenhouse gas emissions that cause the climate crisis, compared to the 14 most fossil-fuel burning nations, which contribute more than 70%. Despite this, Pacific nations are disproportionately vulnerable to climate impacts.
Fiji, for example, is already suffering economic damage and population displacement because of more extreme tropical cyclones. Warmer ocean waters are bleaching its coral reefs, which help protect its coasts, provide habitat for fish, and attract tourists, while changing rainfall patterns and rising temperatures threaten its agriculture and freshwater supplies.
"Even as one of the nations least responsible for the climate crisis, we shoulder some of the most devastating loss and damage," Alisi Rabukawaqa, a 350.org Pacific Council Elder from Fiji, said in a statement. "The fight against the climate crisis is fought on multiple fronts—through community and storytelling, through activism and diplomacy."
"Tuvalu calls on all countries to follow the example set by Fiji today and commit to addressing the root cause of the climate crisis: Fossil Fuels."
Pacific island nations have emerged as diplomatic leaders in the struggle for a just response to the climate emergency. Fiji was the first nation to formally ratify the Paris agreement. Then Vanuatu became the first nation to call for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty at the U.N. General Assembly in New York in September 2022, followed by Tuvalu at COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, two months later.
"Vanuatu warmly welcomes Fiji's resolute call for a Fossil Fuel Treaty," Vanuatu's Climate Minister Hon. Ralph Regenvanu said in a statement. "As fellow Pacific island nations, we share the same vulnerability to the impacts of climate change and recognize the urgent need for decisive action. Our commitment to a sustainable and renewable future sets a powerful example to the world."
Tuvalu's Minister of Finance & Economic Development, Hon. Seve Paeniu, also welcomed Fiji's statement.
"A Fossil Fuel Treaty will ensure that we do not cross the 1.5 warming threshold, which is a red line for Tuvalu, Fiji, and all Pacific Small Island Developing States who are constantly having to deal with extreme weather events and the degradation of our lands and livelihoods," Paneiu said. "Tuvalu calls on all countries to follow the example set by Fiji today and commit to addressing the root cause of the climate crisis: Fossil Fuels."
The proposed Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty has three pillars: an end to fossil fuel expansion; a fair phase out of fossil fuels, with nations that have historically contributed more to the current emergency moving faster; and a just transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy that ensures no workers, communities, or nations are abandoned.
Treaty supporters note that fossil fuels were responsible for 86% of carbon dioxide emissions this decade, yet the Paris agreement doesn't mention fossil fuels by name and the agreements coming out of COP27 did not mention oil and gas.
Six Pacific island nations–with Tonga, the Solomon Islands, and Niue joining Fiji, Vanuatu, and Tuvalu–signed the Port Vila Call for a Just Transition to a Fossil Fuel-Free Pacific in March, which included support for the treaty.
"With oil CEO, Al Jabar, at the helm of COP28 this year, we are going to need all of the Pacific strength we can get to fight the propaganda of fossil fuel expansion."
"The Pacific continues to show the world what real leadership during a crisis looks like and that without greater ambition and vision, we cannot overcome the greatest threat to our planet," Auimatagi Joe Moeono-Kolio, Pacific director of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, said in a statement.
Outside the Pacific, the treaty has also been backed by the World Health Organization, the European Parliament, 84 municipal and regional governments including the California Senate, 101 Nobel laureates, 2,150 civil society organizations, 3,000 scientists and academics, and more than 600,000 individuals.
"Without a managed phaseout of fossil fuels, there is no hope of meeting the aims of the Paris agreement," Moeono-Kolio said. "A Fossil Fuel Treaty would play a key role in reducing the risks of extreme weather events and other physical impacts we experience almost daily now in the Pacific. We stand ready to support the Pacific's vision of a world free from fossil fuels."
Joseph Sikulu, 350.org's Pacific managing director, also hoped that Pacific leadership would yield results during the upcoming COP28 negotiations in the UAE.
"With oil CEO, Al Jabar, at the helm of COP28 this year, we are going to need all of the Pacific strength we can get to fight the propaganda of fossil fuel expansion," Sikulu said. "Another world is possible, one built on justice, equity and safe renewable energy, and I firmly believe the Pacific is going to lead us in getting there."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Historic Moment': Applause as UN Adopts Climate Justice Resolution
"We have witnessed a win for climate justice of epic proportions," said Vanuatu's prime minister after the passage of a resolution asking the world's highest court to clarify national obligations for climate action and the legal consequences of inaction.
Mar 30, 2023
Climate justice advocates cheered Wednesday after the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution calling on the International Court of Justice to issue an advisory opinion on climate change and human rights.
The newly approved measure, introduced by Vanuatu and co-sponsored by more than 130 governments, asks the world's highest court to outline countries' legal responsibilities for combatting the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency and the legal consequences of failing to meet those obligations.
"We have witnessed a win for climate justice of epic proportions," Vanuatu Prime Minister Ishmael Kalsakau said after the resolution was adopted by consensus. "Today's historic resolution is the beginning of a new era in multilateral climate cooperation, one that is more fully focused on upholding the rule of international law and an era that places human rights and intergenerational equity at the forefront of climate decision-making."
"This is a landmark moment in the fight for climate justice as it is likely to provide clarity on how existing international law... can be applied to strengthen action on climate change."
Like other Pacific Island nations, Vanuatu bears little responsibility for the climate crisis but is acutely vulnerable to its impacts, including existentially threatening sea level rise and intensified cyclones such as those that displaced thousands in the region just weeks ago. The country began pushing for the ICJ resolution in 2021, following a campaign launched in 2019 by a group of students from a university in nearby Fiji.
The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) hailed its passage as "a historic moment."
So too did Marta Schaaf, director of Amnesty International's Climate, Economic, and Social Justice program.
"This is a landmark moment in the fight for climate justice as it is likely to provide clarity on how existing international law, especially human rights and environmental legislation, can be applied to strengthen action on climate change," said Schaaf. "This will help mitigate the causes and consequences of the damage done to the climate and ultimately protect people and the environment globally."
“We salute this remarkable achievement by Vanuatu, and other Pacific Island states, which originally brought this urgent call to advance climate justice to the U.N.," Schaaf continued. "Today's victory sprang from the efforts of youth activists in Pacific Island states to secure climate justice."
Schaaf urged the ICJ "to provide a robust advisory opinion to advance climate justice." Last week's report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, she noted, shows that "the 1.5°C global warming limit agreed to in Paris in 2015 is likely to be breached before 2035 unless urgent action is taken." Temperature rise of roughly 1.1°C to date is already fueling catastrophic weather, with even more lethal impacts on the horizon barring transformative action.
"We see some fossil fuel-producing states both resisting calls to phase them out, and falsely promoting carbon capture and storage as a technological fix for the climate," said Schaaf. "An advisory opinion from the court can help put a brake on this accelerating climate disaster."
CIEL's Climate and Energy program director Nikki Reisch also applauded the resolution, saying it marks an important step "toward clarifying what existing law requires states to do to curb climate change and protect human rights."
"Courts can translate the clear scientific evidence that fossil fuels are driving the climate crisis into clear legal imperatives to phase them out now and implement proven available solutions."
Despite volumes of indisputable scientific evidence highlighting the need quickly replace fossil fuels—the leading source of greenhouse gas pollution—with renewables, last year's COP27 negotiations ended, like the 26 preceding U.N. climate summits, with no concrete commitment to wind down coal, oil, and gas production.
In the absence of a needed crackdown on the fossil fuel industry, immensely profitable oil and gas giants are planning to expand their operations in the coming years even though their executives know it means locking in additional planet-heating emissions and cataclysmic temperature increases.
While a handful of Pacific Island governments are leading calls for a global just transition to clean energy, other governments are actively aiding the continued extraction and combustion of fossil fuels.
Earlier this month, for instance, the Biden administration, which claims to view the climate crisis as an existential threat, approved ConocoPhillips' Willow project in the Alaskan Arctic—the largest proposed oil drilling endeavor on public land in U.S. history—and moved ahead with Lease Sale 259, one of the largest-ever offshore drilling auctions in the Gulf of Mexico.
As CIEL pointed out, "impacted communities across the globe are finding themselves with few alternatives but to resort to courts in their pursuit of clear rules to guide state climate action and hold states accountable for their failures."
According to The New York Times:
The [ICJ's] opinion would not be binding. But, depending on what it says, it could potentially turn the voluntary pledges that every country has made under the Paris climate accord into legal obligations under a range of existing international statutes, such as those on the rights of children or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That could, in turn, lay the groundwork for new legal claims. (A few national courts have already relied in part on international law to rule in favor of climate activists' lawsuits.)
Courts play a critical role "in breaking through the inertia when politics break down," said Reisch. "Courts can translate the clear scientific evidence that fossil fuels are driving the climate crisis into clear legal imperatives to phase them out now and implement proven available solutions. They also can—and indeed must—hold states accountable for the mounting suffering caused by their failure to act."
Describing climate justice as "both a moral imperative and a prerequisite for effective global climate action," U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres called the ICJ resolution "essential."
Advisory opinions issued by the world's top court "have tremendous importance and can have a long-standing impact on the international legal order," he added. Such a move "would assist the General Assembly, the U.N., and member states to take the bolder and stronger climate action that our world so desperately needs."
The passage of the ICJ resolution comes just days after a pair of scholars put forth a novel legal theory of "climate homicide," which aims to hold fossil fuel corporations criminally liable for disaster deaths.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Addressing Crisis 'Existentially Imperiling' Its People, Vanuatu Declares Climate Emergency
"We are in danger now, not just in the future," said Prime Minister Bob Loughman.
May 28, 2022
Vanuatu on Friday declared a climate emergency, blaming the ecological crisis for "undermining the fundamental human rights of present and future generations" on the South Pacific island nation.
Its Parliament unanimously passed the motion introduced by Prime Minister Bob Loughman.
"The climate crisis is a human rights crisis," said Loughman.
"Civil society and friends, this is not a crisis that I or my people will continue to accept; not before we have done everything within our powers to stop it," he added.
MP for Port Vila and opposition leader Ralph Regenvanu shared the news on Twitter. He wrote that the first of the resolution's 17 points states, "The Parliament of Vanuatu declares that a climate emergency exists that is now existentially imperiling the people, societies, and natural resources of the Republic of Vanuatu."
The nation, as Loughman noted, is already being impacted by extreme weather events fueled by the climate emergency--a crisis to which it's contributed little.
"The Earth is already too hot and unsafe," he said. "We are in danger now, not just in the future."
The declaration won praise from climate activist Gladys Habu of the Solomon Islands, who said, "Thank you Vanuatu for leading the way."
Last year, Vanuatu said it would call on the International Court of Justice to clarify nations' responsibilities on climate with respect to present and future generations, a campaign that's now gathered support from 1,500 civil society groups.
In a tweet welcoming the emergency declaration, the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network praised Vanuatu for being a consistent advocate for bold climate action.
"The Vanuatu Government has always led the way when it comes to bold climate action and addressing the climate crisis with the urgency that it deserves," the group said.
Keep ReadingShow Less
At 'Pivotal Moment' in Planetary Emergency, UN Appoints Inaugural Expert on Climate Crisis and Human Rights
"There is so much at stake," said the new special rapporteur.
Apr 03, 2022
Environmental defenders welcomed the United Nations' inaugural appointment Friday of a special rapporteur on the climate crisis and human rights.
Academic Ian Fry--a dual citizen of Tuvalu and Australia and an expert on Pacific Island climate policy--was appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council following the body's October 2021 adoption of a historic resolution recognizing the human right to a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment.
The Human Rights Council at the time also established the expert position, formally called the special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights in the context of climate change.
Related Content
In 'Historic' Vote, UN Human Rights Council Recognizes Right to Clean Environment
The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) welcomed Fry as the new mandate holder.
In a statement, CIEL pointed to Fry's background as a climate negotiator for the Pacific Island States within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and praised his sustained support for "human rights-based approaches to climate action" as well as "insights into the heightened risks faced by the most vulnerable communities, least responsible for the climate emergency, such as small island states," expertise that "positions him well to leverage the human rights regime in support of those needing urgent action and justice."
The appointment of the climate-focused rapporteur could additionally "galvanize much-needed attention to the intersection of human rights and climate change at a pivotal moment" and "be an opportunity to protect and uplift the human rights of communities and Indigenous Peoples at the frontlines of the climate crisis," said CIEL.
Fry, for his part spoke of an "enormous challenge" in front of him.
"We already know that thousands of people are being displaced each day as a consequence of climate change-related weather events," he said in a statement. "We know that Indigenous peoples are at the forefront of climate change impacts. From my personal experience in working in a coral atoll nation like Tuvalu, I know that the human rights of the inhabitants are being affected by the impacts of climate change."
"I hope I can do [the position] justice," he added. "There is so much at stake."
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy