While addressing a discussion at the Munich Security Conference 2024 in Germany Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina urged world leaders to unlock climate finance for the victim nations and end the arms-race to divert resources into climate fund.
We highly appreciate Sheikh Hasina’s time-befitting call for the international community to immediately stop war and address the impact of climate change. Bangladesh Primer reiterated that developed countries must fulfill their commitment to provide $100 billion per year up to 2025, based on a delivery plan.
Our prime minister feels it is high time to utilise the network to share views on tackling the complex global challenges and bring positive outcomes not only for their respective countries but also for mankind. So, senseless arms race must be stopped and resources need to be diverted into mobilising the much-needed fund for fighting climate change. All have to keep in mind that when the existence of humanity is at stake, pursuing narrow interests will come to nothing. Global adaptation actions over climate change are still far from the pace of devastation just for lack of funds and political will. Bangladesh is often referred to as the ground zero for climate change adverse impacts. Adapting to the damage already done is as important as the process of reducing future losses and damages.
But global adaptation actions are far from keeping pace with the scale of devastation due to the lack of finance and political will. On the other hand, as the global food system is reeling from the Israel-Gaza and Russia-Ukraine war, sanctions and counter-sanctions, the impact Covid-19 pandemic, and the droughts across Africa, South Asia, and the Middle-East, the World leaders should use their strong positions to deliver better outcomes for people in need and to commit to sustained engagement to uphold the norms that safeguard humanity.
Developed countries must fulfil
their commitment to provide
$100 billion per year up to 2025,
based on a delivery plan
Besides, financial, and energy securities have greatly impeded the achievement of SDGs in developing countries. The interlinked crises of the past few years have pushed up prices of food, energy and commodities globally, weakening the efforts to recover from the pandemic.
As an energy and food importing country, Bangladesh’s import bills have shot up significantly, having a negative impact on our foreign currency reserves. In view of the bloody Gaza-Israel and Russia-Ukraine war, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has again sent a message to the world leaders for peace, urging them to stop war and restore mutual respect among the nations.
The world must get rid of wars and conflicts, illegal occupations and mindless killings of unarmed civilians, especially women and children, which the globe is witnessing in Gaza and elsewhere. The impacts of sanctions and counter-sanctions are also felt far away from the conflict zones. An acute imbalance in financing for mitigation and adaptation needs to be addressed by at least doubling the current adaptation finance. Bangladesh always calls for a stronger global solidarity in sharing the burden of climate migrants induced by sea-level rise, salinity increase, river erosion, floods, and droughts.
The country is also calling for establishing regional ‘food banks’ for emergency situation against the spiral of prices of essentials. We are seeing that trust is crumbling, inequalities are exploding and our planet is burning.
But, if the world leaders take the issue seriously and hold discussions in order to find a way out to end the war at any cost, we people will be able to overcome the crisis. Determined and bold leadership is required right now in this regard. In real sense, there is no dearth of food on our planet but the scarcity is simply man-made. And the game of arms and the arms competition must stop.