UN General Assembly
2013

Nations-led action for their resolution, perhaps the greatest threat we face today is climate change. Climate change is a security risk of far greater proportions than many people are prepared to admit. For some low-lying Pacific island countries, climate change may well lead to their eventual extinction as sovereign States. The singular importance and urgency of climate change to our region was given added prominence today when Pacific Forum leaders met with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Our Chair, the President of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, presented to the Secretary- General the Majuro Declaration for Climate Leadership, which is an effort by our region — the most likely to be first and worst affected by climate change — to launch a new wave of more determined leadership across the globe, aimed at accelerating the reduction and phasing down of the world’s greenhouse-gas pollution before it is too late. The root causes of climate change and the means for addressing them are widely known. We in the Pacific know already from bitter and harsh experience, as will