UN General Assembly
2015

Our pleas over the years on the 1.5°C and the loss and damage caused by climate change have largely gone unnoticed. At least the countries our messages had been intended for have remained unconvinced, but I hope not uninterested. Part of this, I think, is due to some misguided notion that climate phenomena and related events affect small island developing States only. Some might have concluded already that climate change is not life-threatening and does not affect them, either because their countries are huge in size or have well-developed infrastructure to shield them from any real damage from climate change impacts. It may also be that there is an implied sense that if the large problems of the bigger, stronger, more populous and well-developed countries are solved, then the solutions to the afflictions of SIDS will automatically follow. As a result, challenges facing SIDS are conveniently viewed by others through the same lens that blurs the distinctions and fails to bring out the truth about the urgency and dire consequences of the problems we face because of climate change.