A movement against illegitimate debt and climate justice was launched in the capital on Sunday after a four-day regional meeting (July 6-9) on the issue organized by Rural Reconstruction Nepal (RRN), an NGO, along with the Jubilee South-Asia Pacific Movement on Debt and Development (JS-APMDD). [break]
Progressive civil society organizations and mass based organizations, NGOs, Federation of Nepal, GEFONT, ANPFa, ANWA, FECOFUN, Dalit NGO Federation, Youth Action Network, Climate Himalaya and other CSOs engaged on the issues of debt and climate change participated the event.
The participants argued that given the transitional phase facing Nepal, the government of Nepal can ask for cancellation of all illegitimate debts incurred by the previous regimes. They cited the need for further consultations on debt issues with government officials, parliamentarians, civil society, including media and mass-based organizations.
The event on Climate Justice and Climate Finance also gathered other observations and studies on the ill-effects of global warming and unpredictable weather patterns currently facing Nepal. Among them are decreasing freshwater reserves because of the rapid melting of glaciers, flash-floods due to the swelling of rivers and erratic precipitation patterns.
The climate change, experts said, is adversely affecting livelihood of the farmers as agriculture is the mainstay of a majority of Nepalis. They also said that the country is facing threat in terms of possibility of widespread diseases associated with floods, drought and abrupt weather changes.
Lidy Nacpil, Regional Coordinator of JS-APMDD, said, “What the Nepali people have to understand is that this is not of their own doing. The very reason why you have to endure all this is because of the excessive green house gas emissions by industrialized countries.”
“That is why we are demanding reparations for the climate debt that the North owes Nepal together with the rest of the developing countries. Without such reparations, there won´t be any climate justice,” he added.
Also speaking at the program, Dr Sarbaraj Khadka, Director of RRN, said, “Nepal now requires huge finances to fight the ill effects of climate change. This is our right.”
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