In the run-up to the Eastern Partnership Summit in Vilnius on November 28th, the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan met in an attempt to restart negotiations over the ongoing Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Although the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan officially ceased over twenty years ago, current tensions between the two states serve as the main impediment to resolving various regional issues, including growing freshwater scarcity in the South Caucasus.
Pressures on water quantity and quality in the region are still moderate. However, anthropogenic and climate-induced reductions in water supply, coupled with instability within the social and economic systems, are likely to lead to a worsening of interstate relations, and could exacerbate current tensions in this volatile region.
But this reality also reveals an opportunity for conflict-resolution. Shared natural resources imply possible mutual benefits of cooperation between states. In particular, cooperation over water resources offers an opportunity for building trust.
This will not be easy. A significant lack of trust and technical know-how in the region, as well as an asymmetry in resources available for environmental protection, are main obstacles to cooperation. That is why an engaged international community, particularly the European Union (EU), will be critical.
For the complete article, please see The Center for Climate & Security.
To fight illegal coca plantations and conflict actors’ income sources, Colombia’s president wants to loosen the ban on aerial glyphosate spraying. However, considering the dynamics of organised crime, the use of toxic herbicides will not only fail to achieve its aim, it will have many adverse effects for the environment and human health, fundamentally undermining ways to reach peace in the country. International cooperation and national policy-makers need to account for this peace spoiler.
As India grapples with the worsening impacts of climate change, the need to strengthen its adaptation efforts has become more significant than ever. Climate diplomacy and mainstreaming climate adaptation into the most vulnerable sectors could provide some solutions to overcoming barriers, such as the lack of sustainable funding.
“Climate Security risks will materialise in very different ways and forms, whether we talk about Lake Chad or about the Arctic, Bangladesh and the Small Island Developing States,” said the EU’s Ambassador to the United Nations in New York, Joao Vale de Almeida, in his opening remarks. “But for the EU, there is no doubt, as underlined in 2016 in our Global Strategy, and reaffirmed by the 28 Ministers of Foreign Affairs, that climate change is a major threat to the security of the EU and to global peace and security more generally,” he said.
The challenges facing the international community are growing while the willingness to cooperate seems to be waning. Foreign policy must help bridge this gap. One way to accomplish this is by pushing forward a major achievement of multilateralism: the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. At a side event during the 2019 High-Level Political Forum, diplomats and policy experts discussed the role of foreign policy in the global sustainability architecture.