STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Jun 22 2023 (IPS) - The wildfires raging in Canada are yet another reminder that climate change is already having an impact on all our lives. As the smoke clears around the United Nations building in New York, we are likely to see a renewed push for the UN Security Council to tackle the security risks posed by climate change, including in the upcoming New Agenda for Peace policy brief from UN Secretary-General António Guterres.

Recent reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), supported by a growing body of scientific evidence, reach the inescapable conclusion that climate change is a meaningful factor in the risks of violent conflict.
​
In fact, one group of experts recently suggested that only a ‘misreading of the state of science’ could allow any doubt over the links between climate change and insecurity.
Despite the evidence, and despite the Security Council having already passed more than 70 resolutions and statements on climate-related security risks, efforts to make climate change a standing item on the Security Council’s agenda have so far failed...

Read the complete article here. Source: IPS News

On World Environment Day, 5 June, Pope Francis spoke to organizers of the "Green & Blue Festival: Earth For All".

Pope Francis stated that while "Our understanding has.. grown concerning the impact our actions will have on our common home and on those who dwell here, both now and in the future", the challenge we face with climate change "needs a cohesive and proactive response...because it requires a change of course, a decisive shift in the current model of consumption and production, all too often entrenched in the “throwaway” culture that is indifferent towards both the environment and people..."

​Read the complete speech here