BAKU: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday said that the government of Pakistan was taking all possible steps to ensure the security
BAKU: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday said that debt cannot become the “acceptable new normal” in climate financing, as he addressed the challenges faced by developing countries within the global climate finance framework.
“We stand at a crucial threshold where global climate finance framework must be redefined to effectively meet the needs of vulnerable nations,” he told a Climate Finance Round Table Conference organised by Pakistan on the sidelines of the two-day World Leaders Climate Action Summit.
He explained that financing in the form of loans increases the debt of developing nations and pushes them towards “mounting debt traps” which he referred to as “death traps”.
“Debt cannot become the acceptable new normal in climate financing which is why we must resume focus on non-debt financing solutions enabling countries to fund climate initiatives,” the PM said.
“Despite years of promises and commitments, the gaps are growing, leading to aggregate barriers in achieving objectives of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).”
Pakistan is ranked among the top 10 most climate-vulnerable countries, according to the Global Climate Risk Index 2021. It has faced increasingly frequent and severe weather events, such as unprecedented floods, intense monsoon rains, devastating heat waves, rapid glacial melting and glacial lake outburst floods.
Calling climate financing an “urgent need of the hour”, PM Shehbaz said that developing countries need to deliver Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and “need an estimated $6.8 trillion by 2030 to implement less than half of their current NDCs”.
He further urged donor countries to “fulfil their commitment”, which is 4.7 per cent of their gross national product and capitalise on existing climate funds.
The PM said that Pakistan can relate to the “agony and pain of other vulnerable countries”, highlighting how the country faced two devastating floods.
While emphasising transparency and coordination in financial commitments made to developing countries, he stated that Pakistan alongside other developing countries, calls for stronger more equitable climate finance mechanisms under the UNFCCC.
He reiterated the pertinent need for reform of international financial architecture saying that “now is the time to build up on the momentum for international financial reforms” so that no nation is left behind in the global response to climate change.
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