PACIFIC Leaders agree the only solutions which will address the existential threat caused by climate change are already tracked in the Paris Agreement and there is an urgent need to implement what has already been agreed to.
Pacific Islands Forum secretary general Henry Puna said this in a statement where he also emohasised the need to act with urgency.
“Increasingly, and again in the 2050 Strategy for our Blue Pacific Continent, today’s Pacific Leaders have pointed to the existential threat of the climate emergency our world has found itself in,” he said.
“They agree that the only solutions which will address that existential threat are already tracked in the Paris Agreement.
“For our Pacific leaders, a return to the agreement outcomes must be global, urgent, and decisive.
“Our 2050 Implementation Plan endorsed by Forum Leaders in the days before coming to COP28, recognizes that these substantive agreements must be followed by resourcing and action.”
Mr Puna pointed to the “ongoing search for innovation and ownership” which Pacific resilience is delivering on climate, and noted the announcement by Saudi Arabia in recent weeks of a $USD 50m grant to support the new Pacific Resilience Facility as a Pacific-led response to disasters.
“COP28 is a complex global space where Pacific and other like-minded leaders must do all they can to scale up a rapid return to a 1.5-degree limit on global warming. Detailing how and when isn’t going to be easy. But it must be done, and it needs to be done now.”
