Contemporary politics,local and international current affairs, science, music and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
Saturday 12 September 2015
Pacific leaders respond to Australian minister's sea level remarks
Pacific leaders have hit out at the insensitivity of an Australian
minister’s apparent joke at the expense of low-lying nations struggling
against rising sea levels.
Immigration minister, Peter Dutton, was caught on a microphone
chatting with Australian prime minister, Tony Abbott, and social
services minister, Scott Morrison, while waiting for a community
roundtable to begin on Friday in Canberra.
Dutton implied that meetings at the recent Pacific Islands Forum in
Papua New Guinea had also begun late because: “Time doesn’t mean
anything when you’re about to be, you know, have water lapping at your
door.”
A photo taken in December 2008 shows a cemetery on the shoreline in
Majuro Atoll being flooded from high tides and ocean surges in the
low-lying Marshall Islands. Photograph: Giff Johnson/AFP/Getty Images. Abbott laughed at the comment, until Morrison pointed out that there was a live microphone hovering above their heads.Marshall Islands
foreign minister, Tony de Brum, who has been a high profile advocate
for stronger action on climate change in the UN climate process,
expressed his offence on Twitter: Tony de Brum✔@MinisterTdB Dismayed Aust ministers joking about sea level rise in Pacific. Seems insensitivity knows no bounds in the big polluting island down sth.TdB Anote Tong, the president of Kiribati, described the joke as vulgar. “What kind of a person is he?” he asked the ABC.
“As long as there is this kind of attitude, this kind of arrogance in
any position of leadership, we will continue to have a lot of tension.”Gary Juffa, the governer of the Papua New Guinea province of Ono, focused on the Australian prime minister’s reaction: Over the past decade, climate change and rising sea levels have begun to strangle life in low-lying Pacific island countries. In De Brum and Tong’s atoll nations people are already struggling with regular inundations, more severe droughts and displaced people.
Storm surges washing across Ejit Island in Majuro Atoll, Marshall
Islands, in early 2014. Photograph: Giff Johnson/AFP/Getty Images De Brum has consistently said
that even if the upcoming Paris climate talks keep the atmosphere
within the (increasingly unlikely) target of a 2C temperature rise on
pre-industrial levels, that his islands may become uninhabitable. He and
other island leaders have said climate science gives them little chance
in a world that warms more than 1.5C. — Tony de Brum (@MinisterTdB)September 11, 2015 Best way for Australia to show it cares is for it to bring a proper #climate target to #Paris2015 in line with the latest science. TdB The furore broke out just hours after the Australian prime minister rejected a plea from Pacific countries to ramp up its carbon reduction targets, which observers called “pathetically inadequate” when they were released in August. Earlier, Tong told the ABC that Australia’s refusal to consider scaling up its ambitions was disappointing. “I would really have loved to go back and say yes, we had support,
solid support from all of the Pacific neighbours including our developed
neighbours. How does it feel? I’ve learned to live with the
disappointments,” he said. It is not the first time De Brum has used strong language to attack Australia. Earlier in the year he said the country had “jerked around” the Marshall Islands by cutting its foreign aid budget. Dutton has so far refused to comment on the incident.
A photo taken in December 2008 shows a cemetery on the shoreline in
Majuro Atoll being flooded from high tides and ocean surges in the
low-lying Marshall Islands. Photograph: Giff Johnson/AFP/Getty Images. Abbott laughed at the comment, until Morrison pointed out that there was a live microphone hovering above their heads.Marshall Islands
foreign minister, Tony de Brum, who has been a high profile advocate
for stronger action on climate change in the UN climate process,
expressed his offence on Twitter:
Dismayed Aust ministers joking about sea level rise in Pacific. Seems insensitivity knows no bounds in the big polluting island down sth.TdB Anote Tong, the president of Kiribati, described the joke as vulgar. “What kind of a person is he?” he asked the ABC.
“As long as there is this kind of attitude, this kind of arrogance in
any position of leadership, we will continue to have a lot of tension.”Gary Juffa, the governer of the Papua New Guinea province of Ono, focused on the Australian prime minister’s reaction: Over the past decade, climate change and rising sea levels have begun to strangle life in low-lying Pacific island countries. In De Brum and Tong’s atoll nations people are already struggling with regular inundations, more severe droughts and displaced people.
Storm surges washing across Ejit Island in Majuro Atoll, Marshall
Islands, in early 2014. Photograph: Giff Johnson/AFP/Getty Images De Brum has consistently said
that even if the upcoming Paris climate talks keep the atmosphere
within the (increasingly unlikely) target of a 2C temperature rise on
pre-industrial levels, that his islands may become uninhabitable. He and
other island leaders have said climate science gives them little chance
in a world that warms more than 1.5C. — Tony de Brum (@MinisterTdB)
September 11, 2015 Best way for Australia to show it cares is for it to bring a proper #climate target to #Paris2015 in line with the latest science. TdB The furore broke out just hours after the Australian prime minister rejected a plea from Pacific countries to ramp up its carbon reduction targets, which observers called “pathetically inadequate” when they were released in August. Earlier, Tong told the ABC that Australia’s refusal to consider scaling up its ambitions was disappointing. “I would really have loved to go back and say yes, we had support,
solid support from all of the Pacific neighbours including our developed
neighbours. How does it feel? I’ve learned to live with the
disappointments,” he said. It is not the first time De Brum has used strong language to attack Australia. Earlier in the year he said the country had “jerked around” the Marshall Islands by cutting its foreign aid budget. Dutton has so far refused to comment on the incident.
No comments:
Post a Comment