Sydney (Australia), 5 sep (EFE).-the Secretary general of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, pledged today to exhibit at international forums the need to help the inhabitants of the whole of the Pacific island States threatened by the disappearance under water due to climate change.
“Keep the pressure to be achieved progress until we get real results”, he told Ban the President of Kiribati, Anote Tong, according to the digital edition of the newspaper “Salomon Times”.
The UN Secretary-General also noted that “for the Pacific island countries are at the frontline of climate change” and “are those who are suffering the impact”, because “they are those who have their threatened existence”.
“The international community must do something now”, added Ban.
For its part, the President of Kiribati, a country that according to estimates by experts may disappear under the ocean this century, was skeptical before a positive response to the concerns of SIDS in the region.
“It is unfortunate to say, but perhaps correct that any breakthrough in negotiations in the short term is unlikely,” said Tong and not the Secretary general of the United Nations, to the Australian agency AAP who principle he attributed these words.
Ban assured that it will be the voice of the people of Kiribati, Solomon Islands and other Pacific countries in the negotiations on climate change to be held at the end of this year in Durban, South Africa, and other events international.
“We must help them.” “I hope the Member States to achieve rapid progress in Durban this December,” said the head of the United Nations in another speech during his tour of the Pacific, according to Australian radio ABC.
“But the first and most important is that we do something, even if it takes some time getting the global agreement.” “The Governments of each of the Nations must act (…) without necessarily expecting to achieve the global compact”, added Ban.
The Secretary-General of the United Nations on Saturday reached Australia, the day following it moved to Solomon Islands and today arrived in Kiribati, where tomorrow travel to the New Zealand city of Auckland to inaugurate the Pacific Islands Forum, involving 16 Nations.
Kiribati, an archipelago made up of 33 atolls and a volcanic island is populated by some 105,000 people in less than half a century, if met forecasts of scientists, will have to abandon their land following the rise in the level of the water.
Other nations of the Pacific, such as Salomón, Fiji, Nauru, Tonga and Vanuatu, will lose all or part of its territory when the sea level rises due to climate change.
The Secretary general of the UN, Ban Ki-Moon, attends a joint press conference with Prime Minister Australian, Julia Gillard, on September 3, 2011, in Canberra (Australia). Ban Ban will fight for the Pacific countries threatened by climate change. EFE
