A Place for Nations at the Table

After the First Session of the new round of talks on Climate Change
ended last year in Bali, Indonesia a press reporter lamented the
absence of the voice of indigenous people at the table.  Noting that
indigenous peoples around the world suffer directly from the adverse
affects of industrial carbon emissions and other global warming gases
the reporter said the absence of the important voice of indigenous
people was a serious error.

Now it is more than fourteen months since the Bali meeting sponsored by
the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change came to a
dramatic end with the United States of America being shamed by the
delegate from Papua New Guinea into agreeing to participate in the
unfolding agenda. Four agenda-setting meetings and expert meetings have
been conducted in places like Bangkok, Accra and Berlin and still
delegates from indigenous nations have not been invited to sit at the
table.

A Conference of Parties meeting number 14 (COP14) is about to convene
in Poznan, Poland beginning December 1. In advance of that meeting the
Minority Rights Group in London released a call for the Poznan meeting
to include indigenous peoples.  Well, the Inuit Circumpolar Conference
will go to that meeting and sit as an observer. It is possible that a
few indigenous nations will decided to send observers even though there
is not place at the table for them to actively and formally participate
in the talks.  The Poznan meeting will literally set the terms of
reference for what will be an agreement on Climate Change to be tabled
in November 2009 at what will be called the Conference of Parties 15
(COP15) meeting in Copenhagen.  Denmark has noted quietly that no
indigenous nation delegates are planned for participation in the COP15
negotiations. Importantly, Denmark and Sweden have begun commenting on
the importance of indigenous nations participating in the COP15 meeting.

States’ governments have seriously faltered over the past decades when
the question of indigenous nations’ participation in international
meetings is concerned.  The most vociferous opponents of indigenous
nations, oddly enough, has been the United States of America…and when
it comes to Tibet and East Turkestan (Uygurs) and the millions of
peoples China has categorized as “nationalities” the Peoples’ Republic
of China has also been a major opponent.

If there was ever a time when indigenous nations should sit as equal
parties at negotiations affecting the health of all humanity, the earth
and all else that time is now.  Indigenous nations like Tibet, East
Turkestan, Quinault, Kurdistan, Haudenosaunee, Zapotec, Igbo, Luo,
Shan, Dene, Sami, Inuit and thousands of others must be official
parties, equal to states’ governments, in negotiations establishing the
next round of climate change protocols. No longer observers, indigenous
nations must be active, recognized participants with a vote in the
outcome.

Indigenous nations possess knowledge about nature, climate and the
cosmos that states’ government scientist and philosophers simply lack.
The voice of indigenous nations must be heard and in many instances
heeded for everyone’s sake.

climate change, Poznan, indigenous peoples, UN Framework Convention, COP14, COP15

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Diplomatic Preemption of Environmental Conflicts

President Obama has another challenge facing his foreign policy, environmental policy, economic policy and social policy: climate change driven conflicts throughout the world.

The Kansas City Star reported today what has for sometime been observed by scholars and diplomats: climate change, especially rapid changes are changing environments in such a way as to force whole populations to move into each other’s territories…thus giving rise to greater competition for foods, space and water.  The competition grows into conflicts and eventually violence. Instead of “preemptive war” as US President George Bush  has advocated, the world needs “preemptive diplomacy.”

Here are the conditions the Kansas City Star summarizes in its Sunday edition, that studies indicate are increasing pressures on populations:

•People see their fertile land turn arid and migrate — packing them closer to historical and newfound adversaries.

•Countries already weak or crippled by corruption tip into chaos with even moderate climate change. Crop failures spur violent uprisings and give new energy to ethnic grudges in the face of famine.

•Competition for resources — food, water, oil — grows more tense in times of scarcity.

•Economic collapse in North Africa gives rise to Islamist extremism as blame for climate change focuses on the West. By accident of history and geography, Islamic countries feel the first profound effects of climate change.

•Flooding of coastal areas — particularly in South Asia and the United States — force severe migration and alter regional and even national identities.

•A push to revive the nuclear power industry — as a way to find energy that doesn’t belch more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere — masks rogue countries’ efforts to build atomic weapons.

Diplomacy that preempts conflict, diverts conflict to peaceful solutions must become a priority of every country. Colleges and universities as well as think tanks ought to strengthen their international relations programs to support greater diplomatic capacity to increase the ability of stronger and more stable states to diplomatically intervene in weaker countries that are threatened by environmental conflicts. These conflicts will naturally emerge in environmentally challenged regions of the world and they will include subregions in stable and unstable states. Fourth World nations will be at the center of most of these conflicts since their territories are often the most sensitive to environmental change. Special diplomatic skills will be needed to successfully minimize conflicts. Diplomatic preemption will minimize the tendency toward violence and when supplemented by intelligent environmental, social and economic policies such intervention will reduce the use of war as a means of solving political problems.

The new governments in Europe, China, India, Africa, South America and North America must establish international diplomatic cooperation to meet this new and threatening challenge with intelligence and maturity.
 

climate change, environment, conflict, diplomacy

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