Mexico urges rich nations to back proposed UN-run fund to fight climate change

Mexico’s President today appealed to wealthy countries to contribute to the setting up of its proposed Green Fund, which would be managed by the United Nations and aim to help poor nations combat the effects of climate change.

Felipe Calderón Hinojosa told the General Assembly’s annual high-level debate, taking place at UN Headquarters in New York, that the fund has been proposed to deal with a paradox of climate change – those countries which have contributed the least to the phenomenon are often the most vulnerable to its impact.

“Climate change is not a problem to be faced by nations according to their degree of development,” he said. “It is a task that requires the translation of words into deeds that are to be substantiated by concrete proposals that are based on the principles of common but differentiated responsibilities.”

Mr. Calderón said the planned fund – first announced in May this year – would be set up within the framework of the UN so as to allow incentives for individual States to redouble their efforts to fight global warming.

“It is a great satisfaction for us to see that organizations like the World Bank have already taken the initiative to broaden the availability of resources for the benefit of the countries that need them,” he added.

“I respectfully call upon all nations, especially the most developed, to contribute to the establishment of this Green Fund for the creation of financial instruments to protect the environment on a global scale.”

Echoing that theme, Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo Mendez called for short- and long-term global responses to the problems caused by climate change that are compatible with the economic and social development of each country.

“It is ironic that the poorest, those that are least responsible for climate change, are those who suffer most from its consequences,” he said.

“In terms of major responsibility we frequently witness the irony of conservation levels demanded from those areas of the world that are already oppressed by poverty and exclusion while we see a sustained indifference and low level of self-criticism from the political circles that lead the fate of the world.”

Mr. Lugo Mendez also called for strengthening the powers of the 192-member General Assembly as the most representative body in the UN, where the 15-member Security Council’s resolutions are binding but the Assembly’s are not.

“It should be transformed into a true parliament of the world where the great themes besetting humankind are debated and not hijacked by other organs, where the decisions that are adopted are restricted to a small number of countries who very often do not pay attention to the opinions of the majority of members,” he said.