Waiting is a disaster - Grenada

AOSIS Press Briefing.

AOSIS ministers delivered a stunning rebuke of the negotiations in a sudden press briefing held today.

Ministers told of the visible impacts of climate change and how seriously they are affecting their countries, simultaneously detailing the fragility of their economies.

Grenada is the current chair of AOSIS and passionately stated the following:

• ·         There isn’t enough seriousness at the negotiations.

• ·         He asked “why are we here?  Vacation? No.  I would love to come to Durban for a vacation but we are here because we believe in a multilateral process”

• ·         But it seems that the negotiations are going around in circles.

• ·         He asked “if we believe there is a problem, if we believe the science, why don’t we address the problem?” and said:

• ·         “Waiting is a disaster”

• ·         2020 is too late to start any new agreement.  The science says that 2017 may be a point of no return then clearly 2020 is too late.

• ·         “The islands we live on are seen as a paradise, but you only come for a visit.  We live there.  We have seen the changes in the weather, we have seen the coastal degradation...  We are facing the real effects of the problem.  It’s a living reality for us”

o   “Is this a CoP or is this a corpse – a burial of the process.  We don’t want to end up having to call the undertaker because there is not the political will to do this”

Fiji made a similarly impassioned statement:

• ·         “Waiting is going to be a disaster”

• ·         “Are we prepared to wait for the point of no return”

• ·         We keep hearing that a 2m sea level rise will put Barbados under water, the same is true for Kiribati and Tuvalu.

• ·         For us in Fiji, we were saying perhaps it will happen to the atoll but not us because we’re volcanic.  We have had to start looking at the relocation of the coastal villages.

• ·         The impacts are becoming more and more obvious.

• ·         How long are we going to wait?

• ·         “The situation is not going to improve.  The science is telling us, the experience on the ground is telling us…”

The lead negotiator on finance was a representative from Barbados and continued the impassioned plea for action:

• ·         “We’re small countries, we don’t have any other military, economic or any other kind of power in this process.  We only have power because of the situation.”

• ·         AOSIS have the support of the majority of the parties for their initiatives.

• ·         Want to see a KP2, as well as a legally binding agreement under AWG-LCA.

• ·         KP alone will not deliver the emissions reductions required.

• ·         Raising the level of emission mitigation ambitions.  We’re only doing 60% of what we need to keep below the 2 degree target.

• ·         Implementation and operationalization of Cancun agreements, including the GCF is a important outcome for these talks.

Question from the BBC:

Todd Stern has said that they are committed to the Cancun roadmap and are working to implement it…  He strongly objected to the idea that they are being an obstruction.

AOSIS Chair: “I’m happy to hear that but let me see that in the negotiating room, let me see that in the text, let hear him say that while we sit around the table putting the text together.”

Several things become clear from this press conference.  The level of urgency is rising.  AOSIS members clearly feel they fighting for the survival of their nations, indeed, this is exactly what the science is saying.  This is why the stunning rebuke of the US was delivered in the answer to the BBCs question.

Finally, the MC for the press conference apologised for not having name tags for the speakers and said that it was because the press conference had been thrown together at the last minute.  I think that is a sign of the rising intensity and pressure, not just on delegates, but on the organisers as well.