U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that the evidence for climate change was beyond dispute but it was not too late for international action to prevent its worst impacts.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that the evidence for
climate change was beyond dispute but it was not too late for international
action to prevent its worst impacts.
"The science is clear. It is irrefutable and it is alarming," Mr.
Kerry told a climate conference in Majuro in the
Marshall
Islands
in a video address from
Washington
.
"If we continue down our current path, the impacts of climate change will
only get worse."
Mr. Kerry said without strong, immediate action, the world would experience
threats to critical infrastructure, regional stability, public health, economic
vitality and the long-term viability of some states.
Washington
's top
diplomat was addressing climate experts meeting on the eve of the Pacific
Islands Forum in the
Marshall Islands
, a
low-lying nation where rising seas threaten to swamp many atolls.
"I stand with you in the fight against climate change," he pledged,
adding the issue was a global crisis that was beyond one country to fix and
needed urgent global action.
"If we act together, there is still time to prevent some of the worst
impacts of climate change," he said. "But the people of the
Pacific
Islands
know
as well as anyone that we also need to prepare communities for the impacts that
are already being felt."
Mr. Kerry is not attending the PIF, with Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell
representing the
United States
instead.
Earlier, European Union Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard said the threat
facing low-lying island nations showed that international action on the issue
was overdue.
Ms. Hedegaard expressed concern that some countries may try to delay a 2015
deadline for implementing reductions in emissions and increasing reliance on
alternative energy sources.
She said
Europe
and the Pacific island nations would work together
to push the international community to honor the deadline.
"We have to make joint pressure to say the world is already more than late
[in addressing climate change]," she told the conference in the capital
Majuro.
"2015 must be taken seriously."
Ms. Hedegaard said that even though the Pacific islands were not responsible
for climate change, they were willing to accept tough emissions targets, making
it difficult for other nations not to follow suit.
The 15 PIF nations include island states such as
Kiribati
,
Tuvalu
and
the
Marshalls
,
where many atolls are barely a meter above sea level and risk being engulfed by
rising waters.
The PIF is set to finalize a "Majuro Declaration" on climate change
this week which aims to reinvigorate global efforts to contain global warming.
Tuvalu
Prime
Minister Enele Sopoaga said the situation was "dire" and the Pacific
needed immediate action, not vague promises to do something a few years down
the road.
"We need concrete action on the ground to save
Tuvalu
,
Marshall
Islands
and
Kiribati
,"
he said.
"We have to send a very strong signal out of this panel and forum that we
need a legally binding agreement [on greenhouse gas emissions]."
The plan is to then present the declaration to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon
at the General Assembly meeting in
New
York
at the end of September, "to reenergize the
international community".
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