ISLAMABAD: National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf on Tuesday hailed the decision in COP27 Summit in Egypt of including Pakistan in the list ‘Path­finder Countries’ as Pakistan and six other countries would be the first recipients of ‘Global Shield Funding.

He termed this as a resounding success of parliamentary and foreign diplomacy of Pakistan.

The National Assembly was the first which moved the resolution for creation of Global Climate Fund at IPU General Assembly Session held in Rwanda recently.

This resolution was titled “Creating a Global Fund/Financing facility for climate Vulnerable Countries to Address Loss and Damage Associated with Climate Change”.

The speaker also applauded the efforts of parliamentary delegation led by Deputy Speaker National Assembly Zahid Akram Durrani participating in 27th session of the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27) in Egypt.

Meanwhile, minister for Climate Change Senator Sherry Rehman said that COP27 must put people at the heart of its agenda.

“People and their lives, particularly vulnerable communities, must be at the heart of COP27, along with the will to put them back on their feet as they face the accelerated impacts of climate stress. The loss and damage agenda must be taken forward with clear political will,” said Senator Sherry Rehman, at COP27, said a statement issued by the Ministry of Climate Change.

The minister was speaking at the high-level Loss and Damage plenary, where she said that the Global South had high expectations for the creation and announcement of a Loss and Damage Facility from this COP. “We are still committed to all the goals of this COP despite emitting less than 1 percent GHG globally, but we have expectations from the members of the UNFCCC. We have articulated our concerns at every step, and as we come close to the finishing line, there is a concern that if we don’t see a window or a facility that indicates a commitment towards repairing loss and damages, then it is going to be the ‘other 1 percent’ that will suffer and fail their vulnerable populations.” she stated.

The Minister also highlighted that vulnerable countries under extreme public debt could not be left alone to deal with the impact of climate change, and the global financial system must be rewired to address these new existential challenges.

“We are also told that until 2030, the cost of surviving the impacts of loss and damage – which our emissions haven’t caused – is going to cost us $348 billion. We need to talk about how we can stay alive, and about what commitments come out of this COP27,” she said.

Published in Dawn, November 16th, 2022