Commonwealth countries must unite and use their collective voice to demand that climate finance promises are kept to prevent human suffering, the Commonwealth Secretary-General, the Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC, said at COP29 in Baku today.
At an event to highlight the upcoming launch of the Pacific Resilience Facility (PRF), the Secretary-General said that Commonwealth member states would continue to support the region in its fight against the ravages of climate change.
The PRF is due to launch in 2025 and will help communities become more resilient to climate change and natural disasters. Based in Tonga, the facility is aiming to raise more than US$1.5 billion to help limit global warming to the 1.5 degrees agreed at COP21 in Paris.
The Commonwealth Secretary-General said:
"The Pacific Resilience Facility is an idea whose time has come: a Pacific-owned, Pacific-led solution which will help communities to achieve both at once, and it aligns so well with the support which the Commonwealth offers the Pacific.
"Community-centred, transformative, inclusive, agile, and capable of unlocking vital support, and we can harness the Resilience Facility model, along with the Commonwealth’s voice and convening power, to send the one of the clearest signals in the history of multilateralism: That climate finance promises must be kept."
She added:
"We are clear that the fate of the Pacific is tied to the fate of the world. Because when the ocean rises, it is not just the Pacific that suffers – it is humanity as a whole."
The Secretary-General was speaking alongside the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance for Fiji, Professor Biman Prasad; the Finance Minister for Tonga, Tiofilusi Tiueti; and the Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, Baron Waqa, at an event which saw unanimous support for investment in the PRF.
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Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, Baron Waqa, noted:
"We are now at the very front line of the impacts of climate change. By 2050, climate modelling has shown irreversible inundation for some of our low-lying island states.
"This is a threat to our communities, our land, our identify, our traditions, our way of life, not just for those of us alive today, but for generations to come. The PRF is rethinking climate finance with a sense of urgency so that it can be more accessible for our Pacific communities."
The facility has already received pledges totalling around US$137 million, including US$20 million from the United States of America and US$680,000 from Nauru.
