Vanuatu grateful to Fiji and Tonga

VANUATU has expressed its gratitude to Fiji and Tonga for stepping up to support the country in its bid to table a resolution at the United Nations on climate legal obligations.

About 105 countries have officially co-sponsored this resolution.

Climate envoy Bakoa Maraki Kaltonga said his country had faced a number of climate anomalies, the most recent being the Category 4 Cyclone Judy which had affected about 75 per cent of Vanuatu’s population.

“We are living in a new reality of climate change,” he said.

The country recently signed a new memorandum of understanding with the Waitt Foundation to launch Blue Prosperity Vanuatu, which aims to protect at least 30 per cent of Vanuatu’s oceans by 2030.

“Contrary to the misconception of Vanuatu as a Small Island Developing State (SID), this MoU confirms we are actually a BOSS (Big Ocean Sustainable State) as we aim to influence how the rest of the world relates to its environment.

“For example, we are developing a new long-term strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent, criminalising the crime of ecocide at the International Criminal Court.”

He said they had also moved to ask for an advisory opinion from the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea while developing a Fossil Fuel Non Proliferation Treaty.

“This level of climate and oceans ambition is not new to the Pacific whereby for decades our indigenous communities have been working side by side with the Government to comanage coastal and marine systems.”

He reiterated that the identity of the Pacific was tied to the ocean.