ISLAMABAD: Speaker National Assembly Raja Pervaiz Ashraf has urged Arab countries to help the flood ravaged Pakistan in highlighting the climate issues on international level.
A delegation of Inter-parliamentary Union (IPU), an Arab group, held a meeting with the NA speaker here on Friday. He urged the Arab countries to back the proposal of National Assembly of Pakistan for creation of a global fund by moving an emergency item in the forthcoming IPU Assembly in Kigali, Rwanda from October 11-15, 2022.
He said that the proposal is to demand climate justice for Pakistan by extending judicious support for the flood-ravaged country. Arab countries always supported Pakistan whenever the need arose and hopefully, they would continue to do so in that case as well.
Ashraf said that countries & companies guilty of climate-induced devastations in Pakistan must fulfill their obligation of cutting carbon emissions & releasing pledged climate funds for climate-vulnerable countries. “Today it is Pakistan but tomorrow it can be another country”, he added.
He said that climate tragedy in Pakistan resulted in colossal losses of lives and livelihood, which were beyond imagination. The calamity was not over rather it had outstretched in the form of diseases and food crises. Moreover, it has been negatively impacting the country’s economy, which has already suffered losses above 30 billion US dollars, remarked the Speaker.
The Arab group expressed solidarity with the Speaker over the tragedy and assured to pass on the message to their respective governments and parliaments for backing Pakistan’s demand for climate justice. They agreed that climate change was one of the greatest challenges at the moment and required collective and sincere efforts from all stakeholders, particularly the big polluters. The Palestinian delegation appreciated the unequivocal support of Pakistan for furthering the cause of Palestinian freedom.
The delegation was composed of the members from Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Palestine, United Arab Emirates & Yemen.
