LONDON, United Kingdom (CMC) — Commonwealth Secretary General, Baroness Patricia Scotland, on Monday urged the international community to re-double its efforts to fully understand the impact of climate change given the effects of Hurricanes Irma and Maria on the Caribbean in recent weeks.
Scotland described Hurricane Maria that slammed into Dominica last Monday killing an estimated 28 people and leaving millions of dollars in damages as a “monster” leaving no part of the island untouched.
The Dominican-born Secretary General told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) that in the case of Barbuda, the tiny Caribbean island was “wrecked” when Hurricane Irma, another Category 5 storm made landfall late last month.
“So what does that mean for all of us? It means we must redouble our efforts. We must advocate even more trenchantly to help the world understand the Paris Agreement is non-negotiable. For those of us on the front line across our Commonwealth, the pain and suffering of climate is immense.
“We have seen mudslides in Sierra Leone, we have seen flooding in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India. We have seen the whole of the Caribbean region devastated and we now hear, just a few days ago about earthquakes in Vanuatu…
“So this reality is our new reality, multiplicity of events happening one after the other and we must respond and we must respond now. So coordination, collaboration is vitally important,” she said, noting that “we have been talking here at the UN with all the UN agencies, how do we collaborate with CARICOM and to the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP).
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