Climate Change

This week its President Anote Tong told LOOP news the World Climate Change Meeting in Paris at the end of this year would be their last chance to get the world to listen to them.

He had hoped for Australia and New Zealand to make new commitments at the Pacific Island Forum meeting this week but  this did not happen 

 "Whether we accept it or not is a different question," he said.

“Those islands barely 2m above sea level were the ones on the "frontline" dealing with the issues of climate change,” he said.

The five issues were: climate change, fisheries, ICT, Cervical cancer and human rights abuses in West Papua

LOOP News understands there were some differences on positions by countries on West Papua and Climate change

Tony Abbott arrived in Port Moresby on Wednesday night after climate change dominated pre-retreat discussion among the other 15 leaders, with Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O'Neill insisting there was strong support for the forum to have a “single position” on the issue.

O'Neill said the views already expressed in two pre-forum declarations supporting the 1.5 per cent target, rather than the 2 per cent preferred by Australia and New Zealand, would be “very seriously considered” at the retreat.

Kiribati president Anote Tong warned people in the region would have to flee in waves similar to the current migrant crisis in Europe unless stronger action was taken to reduce emissions.

"I think it would be incumbent on them because how relevant [would] their presence be," he said.

"We expect them as a our big brothers, not bad brothers, our big brothers to support us on this one."

Australia and New Zealand are the two most economically powerful members of the PIF, which is meeting this week in Port Moresby.

Representatives from the 16 forum member countries have gathered in Port Moresby to address issues concerning the region, but there are a number of conflicting positions, particularly when it comes to Australia and New Zealand and climate change.

Small island states have called for a global moratorium on new coal mines, which may struggle to get the backing of the wider forum, and enough of a reduction in emissions so that global temperature increases do not exceed 1.5°C over pre-industrial levels.

The Forum is meeting this week in Papua New Guinea’s Port Moresby, with leaders hoping to thrash out a shared position to take to the UN Paris climate change conference in December.

Kiribati President Anote Tong Tuesday said the future of his nation was threatened by climate change and raised the prospect of Australia and New Zealand being asked to leave the grouping if they undermined a consensus on taking serious ­action.

Anote Tong, president of Kiribati, a member of the 16-member Pacific Islands Forum, told journalists who are in Port Moresby to cover the Forum Leaders summit that changes in Forum membership may be the way out of getting a uniform position on climate change.

Either Australia leave the Forum, or countries like his and perhaps that of the six other members of the Forum's smaller island states (SIS) exit the Forum membership.

John Key is attending the Forum leaders meeting in Port Moresby which opened last night.

The meeting was preceded by declarations by Small Islands States, NGOs and Fiji's Pacific Islands Development Forum calling for greater action including no more than a 1.5 degree rise in global temperature above pre-industrial levels.

Developed nations have traditionally looked at two degrees as a more realistic target.

Mr Key says he is happy with the work New Zealand has done to fight climate change.

Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi had just come back on Thursday from her visit to Fiji, where she attended the Pacific Island Development Forum (PIDF) and discussed how to build resilience to climate change.

“The focus is how the Pacific Islands prepare adaptation and mitigation measures for climate change,” the ministry’s spokesperson, Armanatha Nasir, said .

Kiribati president Anote Tong made the call at the Pacific Islands Forum — which started in Port Moresby on Monday — where Pacific nations have gathered to form a united position to take to the Paris COP21 meeting in December.

“What we are talking about is survival, it's not about economic development... it's not politics, it's survival,” Tong said.

Tong said Australia and New Zealand should use their relative regional power to advocate for smaller countries.