TIMES VIEW/COUNTERVIEW Kiribati man seeks to become the world’s first climate change refugee Oct 19, 2013, 12.06 AM IST TIMES VIEW Recognize new refugee category There are several reasons why the curious case of Ioane Teitiota should be taken note of by policymakers across the globe. Hailing from the Pacific island nation of Kiribati, Teitiota is seeking to become the worlds first climate change refugee by appealing against his deportation from New Zealand. Teitiotas Pacific island homelies only a few metres above sea level and faces a serious risk of being submerged due to climate change. Such a predicament is not unique to the Kiribati islands alone. Inhabitants of several low-lying areas across the world face the prospect of being displaced due to global warming. According to the London-based Environmental Justice Foundation, around 26 million people worldwide have had to migrate due to the effects of climate change. It predicts that this figure could go up to 150 million by 2050. In such a scenario, global policymakers can hardly ignore the plight of vulnerable populations - estimated to be between 500 to 600 million. While continental nations mostly in the developed world are responsible for the largest chunk of greenhouse gases emitted, both historically and at present, smaller island nations as well as low-lying areas in the developing world must bear the brunt of consequences when sea levels rise. This is an inherently unfair process. International justice can be served only if the category of climate refugees is recognized in recompense. Victims of climate change need to be distinguished from victims of natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. In case of the latter there is scope for rehabilitating them in their original homelands, with the help of international aid if need be, after the natural disaster has subsided. But in case of the former their original homelands have been submerged. Thus there is no place left to deport climate refugees back to. On account of historic responsibility and human rights, larger developed nations must recognize and accept climate change refugees. COUNTERVIEW Why create another class of refugees? Suchit Verma Claims being made by environmental groups that one of the biggest costs to the planet from climate change will be mass migration are alarmist. New studies by the London-based International Institute for Environment and Development have established that environmental degradation caused by climate change will not result in massive flow of migrants crossing international borders. On the contrary, research in Bolivia, Senegal and Tanzania, which are highly prone to climate change, suggest that people rarely move huge distances. And even when they are forced to migrate, it is for short durations and the flows are largely internal. Predictions that climate change would create between 200 million to one billion international migrants in the next 40-50 years are unrealistic. The claims fail to recognize the real problems, including the potential for future conflicts, and offer no meaningful solutions on minimizing the effects of climate change. Besides, creating a new category of migrants/refugees will add to the already long list of classification of people displaced by inter-state wars, ethnic conflicts and natural disasters. Since this class of refugees is not covered by existing international protocols, people fleeing the negative impacts of climate change will not have any legal status, especially when few countries will agree on an acceptable definition of a climate refugee. It will not be in the interest of countries like US and China, among some of the worst polluters, to accept climate refugees. Millions of refugees have moved internationally, but their lives have not improved in host countries which often view them as problems and actively discourage their entry. A realistic approach would be for individual governments and the international community to take active measures to check the global use of fossil fuels and hammer out policies that would enhance peoples resilience to climate change. Knee-jerk reactions to international issues potentially create more problems.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Oct 2013 21:55:23 +0000
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