Tuvalu urges COP27 to adopt global treaty on fossil fuels

THE Tuvalu government has urged countries to establish a global treaty to phase out the use of fossil fuels.

Speaking at the COP27 climate summit in Egypt, Tuvalu’s Prime Minister Kausea Natano said “the warming seas are starting to swallow our lands — inch by inch. But the world’s addiction to oil, gas and coal can’t sink our dreams under the waves”.

“We, therefore, unite with a hundred Nobel Peace Prize laureates and thousands of scientists worldwide and urge leaders to join the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to manage a just transition away from fossil fuels.”

Mr Natano explained fossil fuels are the primary cause of this loss and damage financing with coal, oil and gas fuelling 86 per cent of the CO2 emissions in the past decade.

Oil and gas giants, meanwhile, have reported record profits at a time of high energy costs and a cost-of-living crisis.

Support for the treaty

The slow-sinking island nation follows in the footsteps of Vanuatu, Timor-Leste, and New Zealand in making this demand at the international stage.

Opening this discussion at the UN Climate talks, Mr Natano said Tuvalu’s support for the proposed treaty joins a wave of recent momentum behind the proposal which was also endorsed by the European Parliament, the Vatican and the World Health Organisation in recent months.

As Tuvalu faces the prospect of their islands disappearing, the prime minister’s speech comes with the backdrop of loss and damage being a central issue for the COP27 climate negotiations, one that experts expect to only escalate with every fraction of warming.

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