The whole world must hold leaders to account, to urgently implement the agreements made during the Paris accord on climate change, to head off a civilizational threat, which transcends borders and governments. In December last year, countries agreed to address the problem of climate change for the long term, rather than a stop-gap measure, to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions in the second half of this century. We must celebrate their effort. However, the security impacts of climate change show how the consequences of climate change can slip beyond our control and understanding, by spilling across borders, creating new consequences which wildly run out of control.
It is vital, therefore, that civil society groups including my own, the Global Military Advisory Council on Climate Change, hold governments fast to their targets, and explain the consequences of failure.
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Government Gazette
A new start for European foreign policy
The signing ceremony of the Paris Agreement is an important opportunity for Europe to make the successful lessons from Paris into pillars of its diplomatic strategy. In June 2016, European Heads of State and Government will discuss a new “Global Strategy” on security and foreign policy. Delivering the Paris Agreement must be placed directly at its core if Europe wants to stay safe and prosperous.
Climate Change, Disasters, and Security: Unconventional Approaches to Building Stability
It is “not sufficient to look at history for lessons on how we should prepare for and prevent future security risks in a climate change world,” said Swathi Veeravalli, research scientist at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Geospatial Research Laboratory, at the Wilson Center on January 14. Climate change and the extreme weather events it brings pose an “unprecedented” threat to human security.
The European Green Deal has made the environment and climate change the focus of EU action. Indeed, climate change impacts are already increasing the pressure on states and societies; however, it is not yet clear how the EU can engage on climate security and environmental peacemaking. In this light, and in the run-up to the German EU Council Presidency, adelphi and its partners are organising a roundtable series on “Climate, environment, peace: Priorities for EU external action in the decade ahead”.
In January 2020, the German Federal Foreign Office launched Green Central Asia, a regional initiative on climate and security in Central Asia and Afghanistan. The aim of the initiative is to support a dialogue in the region on climate change and associated risks in order to foster regional integration between the six countries involved.
Climate change will shift key coordinates of foreign policy in the coming years and decades. Even now, climate policy is more than just environment policy; it has long since arrived at the centre of foreign policy. The German Foreign Office recently released a report on climate diplomacy recognizing the biggest challenges to security posed by climate change and highlighting fields of action for strengthening international climate diplomacy.
A high-level ministerial conference in Berlin is looking at the impact of climate change on regional security in Central Asia. The aim is to foster stronger regional cooperation, improve the exchange of information and form connections with academia and civil society.