The NATO Parliamentary Assembly on Monday (Oct. 12) adopted a resolution on climate change and international security, urging members of the North Atlantic Alliance to reach an “ambitious” climate agreement in Paris this year and to “fully recognize climate change-related risks as significant threat multipliers in their foreign and security policies”.
The resolution 427 was adopted at the annual session of NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Stavanger, Norway, together with other 7 resolutions addressing NATO’s stance towards terrorism threats, the Ukraine-Russia conflict and the current crises in the Middle East and North Africa.
The assembly was created in 1955 to discuss and influence decisions on key issues affecting the security of the Euro-Atlantic area. Although non-binding on Alliance governments and NATO itself, the Assembly’s resolutions are influential in shaping policy.
NATO’s lawmakers call upon governments of the 28 Alliance members to improve strategic awareness of the security threats increasingly posed by climate change in the form of natural disasters; increased competition for natural resources such as food and water supplies; heightened migration pressures; and growing impacts on public health.
Please continue to read on Climate Observer.
Although water is an essential input for agriculture and industrial production, it is also scarce in many regions. When it crosses international borders via shared rivers, lakes and aquifers, it can become a source of conflict and contention. Yet while water can be a source of instability, especially in the face of climate change, it can also be a source or catalyst for cooperation and even peace.
The Gulf Cooperation Council’s grid operator is studying the feasibility of a cable to Ethiopia, which would run through currently war-torn Yemen.
Small Island States will be facing dramatically higher adaptation costs to build resilience against the kind of impacts the IPCC projects in its most recent Special Report. Thoriq Imbrahim, former Environment and Energy Minister of the Maldives, urges the international community to attend to the political demands of countries particularly exposed to the impacts of climate change and also confront loss and damage with renewed urgency.
Three years after the talks that delivered the Paris Agreement, the world is gathering in Poland to take stock of the progress that has been made and to raise its ambitions. But as new nationalist leaders take power, has the world lost its appetite for climate action?