Global responsibility.

PRIME MINISTER Shehbaz Sharif has rightly reiterated his stand that climate change is a joint global responsibility and that the international community must take collective action to address it and cover the financing needs of nations on the front lines of climate catastrophes. Speaking at the COP27 summit in Egypt's Sharm El Sheikh, he sought to emphasise Pakistan's stance that the country is seeking 'climate justice' in the wake of enormous economic losses of $30bn caused by the devastating floods induced by climate change, and not debt or aid. 'We've to fight and rebuild a resilient and adaptive infrastructure which can only be done through additional funding, not loans ... but the financing gap is widening by the day,' he said in his National Statement as he called for prioritising the Global Goal on Adaptation in terms of financing and timelines to support countries forced to bear the heavy impact of climate change despite contributing negligibly to global warming. He also suggested that loss and damage needed to be part of the core agenda of COP27 to meet the humanitarian needs of those trapped in the crisis of public financing fuelled by debt. Lastly, he called for clearly defining climate finance as a new, additional and sustained resource, with transparent mechanisms, to meet the needs of the vulnerable countries with the required speed and scale.

The...