Dressed in a business suit and standing thigh-deep in seawater on the rocky coastline of his low-lying island home, Tuvalu’s Foreign Minister Simon Kofe addressed dignitaries via video at the Glasgow climate conference this week.
In forums such as Glasgow and elsewhere, the Pacific island states of Tuvalu, Fiji, Samoa and others have pushed advanced economies to cut carbon emissions in the face of global rising sea levels. They’d like a hopeful outcome, but are also having to prepare for the worst. But what if a Pacific island nation like Tuvalu eventually disappears under water? A sovereign nation without land is uncharted territory in international law, says Jane McAdam, director of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW. The world has never faced a situation where a recognised state is destroyed by an environmental phenomenon.
A young woman standing in the rain in the village of Naviavia, which has been bought from Fiji by Kiribati to ensure that Kiribati islanders have a place to go when the sea level overcomes their islands.Namoumou was taken aback: “We were looking at small atoll states like Tuvalu and Kiribati and thought it would happen to them quicker. Fiji has a bigger land mass - we did not expect some of our communities would have to relocate so quickly.
“It is vital we talk about this issue. If we continue to avoid discussion of relocation and displacement, then in the worst-case scenario, when our islands are under water, we will have to go where other countries tell us,” she says. “We want to design and plan this ourselves.” Since the 1970s, there have been more than 300 planned relocations globally within countries where the state has moved populations to protect them from disasters and environmental change, according to research from the Kaldor Centre.
And in 1963 the Australian government planned to relocate the entire population of Nauru to an island off the Queensland coast, also because of phosphate mining damage.But the Nauruans refused to go, saying they did not want to lose their identity. Many criticised resettlement as a quick-fix solution by the governments that had devastated their homeland.
perkinsmiki More BS from the Sydney morning shiit
perkinsmiki Oh my. How long do we have to read this crap? Had the level risen in Sydney Harbour It’s the same body of water.
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