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Americas blogs

Vulnerable in Haiti need climate adaptation costs covered
10 Nov 2009 11:33:00 GMT
Author: Savio Carvalho

Can you imagine your country experiencing three hurricanes in one year? This is exactly what happened last year to Haiti, a small island in the Caribbean. Many other neighbouring island states like Jamaica, the Bahamas, Grenada, and the Dominican Republic were also battered and all have seen a reversal in their growth and development as a result.

But it was Haiti - the poorest of the islands, with the least effective infrastructure - that bore the brunt of the terrifying storms. During a recent visit there, I met with a wide range of civil society organisations that are working on climate change issues. Last year highlighted how vulnerable the islanders are to hurricanes that climate models predict will become more intense and frequent. Action to protect them is urgently needed.

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What Mexico must do differently on climate change
22 Oct 2009 09:33:00 GMT
Author: Savio Carvalho

On a recent trip to boost Oxfam's campaigning in Mexico I had the pleasure of visiting Teotihuacán, or the "City of the Gods," an enormous archaeological complex outside Mexico City.

While looking up at the ancient pyramids and listening to the theories on the city's demise, it struck me that 1,500 years on we have as much to learn about working with our environment as the city's residents did.

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Climate policy to come only after disaster?
16 Oct 2009 15:38:00 GMT
Author: Laurie Goering

Assessments of the prospects for reaching a new global climate deal at Copenhagen in December don't come grimmer than this:

History suggests that transformative moments in global policy making usually come only "in the moments after disaster," Philippe Sands, a leading expert in environmental law, told a crowd in London Thursday night at a forum exploring the prospects for Copenhagen.

That reality suggests that "large numbers of people dying is the only thing that will cause states to realise that things have to change" in terms of combating climate change, argued Sands, a founder of the London-based Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development.

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Latin America urges industrialised countries to foot climate change bill
25 Sep 2009 14:35:00 GMT
Author: Anastasia Moloney

For Latin Americans, tackling climate change often boils down to an economic problem rather than an environmental one: Who is going to pay?

With the region contributing relatively little to climate change - it accounts for around 10 percent of all global carbon emissions, far below other developing regions like Asia - there is a consensus among Latin American leaders that industrialised nations should foot the bill in mitigating the effects of global warming and lead by example in significantly reducing their carbon emissions.

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Colombia's ex-fighters and victims take first steps towards reconciliation
09 Sep 2009 09:56:00 GMT
Author: Anastasia Moloney

Sitting at one end of the conference panel was a former veteran guerrilla commander flanked by armed prison guards. At the other end of the panel sat a woman whose husband had been murdered by the guerrillas. In the middle of the two, was a government official acting as chair of the International Conference on Reconciliation, the first forum of its kind held in Colombia last week.

These scenes, where victims of Colombia's armed conflict share the same stage as their aggressors in public, would be hard to imagine just a couple of years ago.

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