Prime Minister Gaston Browne’s Call for Climate Justice at COP29
Baku, Azerbaijan, 13 November 2024 – Gaston Browne, Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, underscored the urgent need for decisive action against climate change. His speech highlighted the existential threat posed by rising global temperatures, which have already surpassed the critical 1.5-degree threshold, setting new heat records annually.
Prime Minister Browne emphasized that for nations like Antigua and Barbuda, climate change is not a distant warning but a harsh daily reality. He lamented the compounded vulnerability and deepening injustice faced by small island states due to years of inaction and unfulfilled promises from wealthy nations. Despite decades of pledges to provide $100 billion annually to support vulnerable countries, these commitments remain largely unmet.
As discussions at COP29 turn to a New Collective Quantified Goal, Prime Minister Browne criticized proposals that complicate rather than commit. He condemned the attempts by wealthy, polluting countries to shift responsibility onto private capital instead of taking decisive government action. He called for the introduction of a global carbon tax to fund the essential clean energy revolution.
Addressing those most responsible for climate change, Prime Minister Browne declared that the time for moral responsibility and increased climate ambitions is now. He stressed that if promises of support remain unfulfilled, justice must demand their enforcement.
Prime Minister Browne called for a clear and substantial climate finance target at COP29, with adequate funding to help vulnerable nations adapt and build resilience. He advocated for direct investments in the form of compensatory grants, rather than loans that exacerbate debt burdens, to rebuild resilient infrastructure repeatedly damaged by catastrophic climate events. He insisted that this financing must be equitable, accessible, and debt-free to achieve climate justice.
In the absence of real action from those most responsible for climate change, Prime Minister Browne highlighted the turn to international law by vulnerable nations. He announced that Antigua and Barbuda, with a favorable opinion from ITLOS affirming the duty of states to protect the marine environment, will appear before the ICJ in December in solidarity with Vanuatu.
Prime Minister Browne concluded his speech with a resolute message: the time for empty promises is over. He urged COP29 to be a turning point where the world chooses justice over delay, responsible leadership over evasion, and decisive action over empty promises. He called for this year to be the year that promises are honored, as time is running out not only for small states but for all of humanity.
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Worry about nasty duty Antigua first . Charity begins at home .
These speaches just make good sound bites for that moment.
Don’t throw stones when YOU live in a glass house. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
GAS-MAN BROWNE:
The gas that comes out of your mouth pollutes Antigua and Barbuda.So let’s make a deal.Shut your damn mouth and stop the pollution,inna Antigua and Barbuda.
The Honourable Prime Minister would be well aware that Donald Trump reelection is an epochal event for the global efforts to address among other things climate change and its effects. The president elect has a long history denying the science of climate and will most likely reverse the US efforts at home and abroad. Such calls might be futile with Donald Trump as President
In 1995 Antigua & Barbuda experienced 3 hurricanes in 17 days, there was no outcry of climate change having caused this. This Climate Change scam is an elitist dream for a carbon tax, that will be just that, a scam.
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