Global Warming To Drown Tuvalu
Climate change and the future of Tuvalu’s indigenous people
Dec 10, 2006
It shows unspeakable arrogance and irresponsibility for industrial nations responsible for global warming and rising sea levels to refer to Tuvalu as a “sinking island”, as though its impending submersion were a fault inherent in the island and its people. It seems to make people more comfortable to talk of sinking lands, rather than rising seas, as this doesn’t challenge the validity of unsustainable colonial standards of living that continue to ravage the planet.
Tuvalu indigenous representative Minute Alapati Taupo told the United Nations,
“Tuvalu advocating on the issue of climate change is a matter of survival. Its a matter of life and death. Within the next fifty years, we will be under the water. This is really a serious matter for people of Tuvalu.
We are positive if we don’t reduce emissions, we are on that approach of not if but when. We want to be in Tuvalu forever. We don’t want to leave. We want to believe it will never happen. That is why we are fighting the industrial countries.
We dont want to see it happening. We are fighting our cause at every opportunity in the UN… We are innocents in this issue. We didn’t do anything to create the rise in sea levels.
We dont want to believe we are moving. We want to maintain our sovereignty. It is the extinction of a people. Our identity will vanish.”
This same fate is threatening many indigenous island and atoll nations around the globe.
