View previous stories
	Extreme Inequality is a Human Rights Issue by Oxfam, HRW, Tax Justice Network, agencies   Mar. 2024   The Forbes 2024 Billionaires list reports that the number of worldwide billionaires grew by 141 in the past year, with 2,781 people holding wealth that exceeds $1 billion. These people own combined assets of $14.2 trillion, exceeding the gross domestic product of every country in the world except the U.S. and China.   Their collective wealth has risen by 120% in the past decade, at the same time as billions of people across the world have seen their living standards decrease in the face of inflation and the cost of living crisis.   “It’s been an amazing year for the world’s richest people, with more billionaires around the world than ever before,” said Chase Peterson-Withorn, Forbes’ wealth editor. “Even during times of financial uncertainty for many, the super-rich continue to thrive.”   Daisy Pearson, of the campaign group Global Justice Now, said: “It is utterly unconscionable that at a time where masses of the world’s population are living in dire poverty, a few individuals are allowed to amass staggering wealth. This is only possible through exploitation, and their monopolisation of wealth and resources further allows them to amass huge power and influence over decisions that affect our everyday lives. Enough is enough – we should be regulating these barons out of existence.”   Luke Hildyard, the executive director for the High Pay Centre thinktank, said: “The billionaire list is essentially an annual calculation of how much of the wealth created by the global economy is captured by a tiny caste of oligarchs rather than being used to benefit humanity as a whole. It should be the most urgent mission to spread this wealth more evenly.”   While the global population is "living through incredibly unequal times, lurching from one crisis to the next," says Robert Palmer, executive director of Tax Justice U.K., the richest people in the world amass "extraordinary levels of wealth."   "World leaders need to ensure the super rich are paying their fair share, for example through introducing wealth taxes. This would help provide the resources needed to tackle multiple crises from inequality to climate change."   Feb. 2024   Less than eight cents in every dollar raised in tax revenue in G20 countries now comes from taxes on wealth, reveals new analysis by Oxfam ahead of the first meeting of G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors in Sao Paulo, Brazil.   By comparison, more than 32 cents in every dollar (over four times as much) is collected from taxes on goods and services. Taxes on food and other necessities, for example, shift more of the tax burden onto lower-income families.   Oxfam’s research also found that the share of national income going to the top 1 percent of earners in G20 countries has increased by 45 percent over the last four decades. During the same period, the top tax rates on their incomes has fallen by roughly a third (from around 60 percent in 1980 to 40 percent in 2022).   The top 1 percent of earners in G20 countries made more than $18 trillion in income 2022, a figure higher than the GDP of China.   In countries including Brazil, France, Italy, the UK and US, the super-rich pay an effective tax rate lower than the average worker. G20 countries are home to nearly four out of five of the world’s billionaires.   "In country after country, a war on fair taxation has coincided with a war on democracy, putting more money and power into the hands of a tiny, inequality-fueling elite. As the finance ministers of the world's largest economies gather this week, this contest takes center stage: will they reclaim their democracies by taxing the super-rich?" said Katia Maia, Executive Director of Oxfam Brazil.   Brazil, at the helm of the G20, has plans to forge the first global agreement on taxing the super-rich to reduce global inequality. A recent poll has revealed that nearly three-quarters of millionaires in G20 countries support higher taxes on wealth, and over half think extreme wealth is a “threat to democracy.”   Higher taxes on the wealth and income of the richest could raise the trillions of dollars needed to tackle both inequality and climate breakdown. For example, Oxfam estimates that a wealth tax of up to 5 percent on the G20’s multimillionaires and billionaires could raise nearly $1.5 trillion a year.   This would be enough to end global hunger, help low- and middle-income countries adapt to climate change, and bring the world back on track to meeting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) —and still leave more than $546 billion to invest in inequality-busting public services and climate action in G20 countries.   “A fair tax system can curb inequality and foster healthier, more inclusive societies,” said Maia. “Higher taxes for the super-rich means being able to invest in working families, protecting the climate, and making important public services like education and healthcare available to all. It also means being able to repair holes in social safety nets, to soften the blow of future crises.”   http://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/less-8-cents-every-dollar-tax-revenue-collected-g20-countries-comes-taxes-wealth http://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/621477/bp-survival-of-the-richest-160123-en.pdf http://www.theguardian.com/news/2024/feb/29/taxation-worlds-billionaires-super-rich-g20-brazil http://www.taxobservatory.eu/gabriel-zucmans-address-at-the-g20-finance-ministers-meeting-on-february-29-2024/   Jan. 2024   The world’s five richest men have more than doubled their fortunes from $405 billion to $869 billion since 2020 —at a rate of $14 million per hour— while nearly five billion people have been made poorer, reveals a new Oxfam report on inequality and global corporate power. If current trends continue, the world will have its first trillionaire within a decade but poverty won’t be eradicated for another 229 years.   “Inequality Inc.”, published today as business elites gather in the Swiss resort town of Davos, reveals that seven out of ten of the world’s biggest corporations have a billionaire as CEO or principal shareholder. These corporations are worth $10.2 trillion, equivalent to more than the combined GDPs of all countries in Africa and Latin America.   “We’re witnessing the beginnings of a decade of division, with billions of people shouldering the economic shockwaves of pandemic, inflation and war, while billionaires’ fortunes boom. This inequality is no accident; the billionaire class is ensuring corporations deliver more wealth to them at the expense of everyone else,” said Oxfam International interim Executive Director Amitabh Behar.   “Runaway corporate and monopoly power is an inequality-generating machine: through squeezing workers, dodging tax, privatizing the state, and spurring climate breakdown, corporations are funneling endless wealth to their ultra-rich owners. But they’re also funneling power, undermining our democracies and our rights. No corporation or individual should have this much power over our economies and our lives —to be clear, nobody should have a billion dollars”.   The past three years’ supercharged surge in extreme wealth has solidified while global poverty remains mired at pre-pandemic levels. Billionaires are $3.3 trillion richer than in 2020, and their wealth has grown three times faster than the rate of inflation.   Despite representing just 21 percent of the global population, rich countries in the Global North own 69 percent of global wealth and are home to 74 percent of the world’s billionaire wealth.   Share ownership overwhelmingly benefits the richest. The top 1 percent own 43 percent of all global financial assets. They hold 48 percent of financial wealth in the Middle East, 50 percent in Asia and 47 percent in Europe.   Mirroring the fortunes of the super-rich, large firms are set to smash their annual profit records in 2023. 148 of the world’s biggest corporations together raked in $1.8 trillion in total net profits in the year to June 2023, a 52 percent jump compared to average net profits in 2018-2021. Their windfall profits surged to nearly $700 billion. The report finds that for every $100 of profit made by 96 major corporations between July 2022 and June 2023, $82 was paid out to rich shareholders.   Bernard Arnault is the world’s second richest man who presides over luxury goods empire LVMH, which has been fined by France‘s anti-trust body. He also owns France’s biggest media outlet, Les Echos, as well as Le Parisien.   Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest person, holds a “near-monopoly” on cement in Nigeria. His empire’s expansion into oil has raised concerns about a new private monopoly.   Jeff Bezos’s fortune of $167.4 billion increased by $32.7 billion since the beginning of the decade. The US government has sued Amazon, the source of Bezos’ fortune, for wielding its “monopoly power” to hike prices, degrade service for shoppers and stifle competition.   “Monopolies harm innovation and crush workers and smaller businesses. The world hasn’t forgotten how pharma monopolies deprived millions of people of COVID-19 vaccines, creating a racist vaccine apartheid, while minting a new club of billionaires,” said Behar.   People worldwide are working harder and longer hours, often for poverty wages in precarious and unsafe jobs. The wages of nearly 800 million workers have failed to keep up with inflation and they have lost $1.5 trillion over the last two years, equivalent to nearly a month (25 days) of lost wages for each worker.   New Oxfam analysis of World Benchmarking Alliance data on more than 1,600 of the largest corporations worldwide shows that 0.4 percent of them are publicly committed to paying workers a living wage and support a living wage in their value chains. It would take 1,200 years for a woman working in the health and social sector to earn what the average CEO in the biggest 100 Fortune companies earns in a year.   Oxfam's report also shows how a "war on taxation" by corporations has seen the effective corporate tax rate fall by roughly a third in recent decades, while corporations have relentlessly privatized the public sector and segregated services like education and water.   “We have the evidence. We know the history. Public power can rein in runaway corporate power and inequality —shaping the market to be fairer and free from billionaire control.   Governments must intervene to break up monopolies, empower workers, tax these massive corporate profits and, crucially, invest in a new era of public goods and services,” said Behar.   “Every corporation has a responsibility to act but very few are. Governments must step up. There is action that lawmakers can learn from, from US anti-monopoly government enforcers suing Amazon in a landmark case, to the European Commission wanting Google to break up its online advertising business, and Africa’s historic fight to reshape international tax rules.”   Oxfam is calling on governments to rapidly and radically reduce the gap between the super-rich and the rest of society by:   Revitalizing the state. A dynamic and effective state is the best bulwark against extreme corporate power. Governments should ensure universal provision of healthcare and education, and explore publicly-delivered goods and public options in sectors from energy to transportation.   Reining in corporate power, including by breaking up monopolies and democratizing patent rules. This also means legislating for living wages, capping CEO pay, and new taxes on the super-rich and corporations, including permanent wealth and excess profit taxes. Oxfam estimates that a wealth tax on the world’s millionaires and billionaires could generate $1.8 trillion a year.   Reinventing business. Competitive and profitable businesses don’t have to be shackled by shareholder greed. Democratically-owned businesses better equalize the proceeds of business. If just 10 percent of US businesses were employee-owned, this could double the wealth share of the poorest half of the US population, including doubling the average wealth of Black households.   http://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/wealth-five-richest-men-doubles-2020-five-billion-people-made-poorer-decade-division http://policy-practice.oxfam.org/resources/inequality-inc-how-corporate-power-divides-our-world-and-the-need-for-a-new-era-621583/ http://actionaid.org/publications/2024/taxing-windfall-profits-fossil-fuels-and-financial-companies-can-boost-climate http://actionaid.org/publications/2024/briefings-climate-justice-and-finance http://www.ipsnews.net/2024/01/worlds-richest-men-leave-women-far-behind-amid-rising-economic-inequalities/ http://www.globaljustice.org.uk/news/new-report-taken-not-earned-how-monopolists-drive-the-worlds-power-and-wealth-divide/ http://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-0 http://www.ips-journal.eu/topics/economy-and-ecology/addressing-gender-inequality-in-climate-response-7367/ http://globaltaxjustice.org/news/upholding-womens-rights-by-taxing-fairly-for-gender-transformative-care/   Jan. 2024   Asked about the status of women in a world of rising economic inequalities, Rebecca Riddell, policy lead for economic and racial justice at Oxfam America, told IPS: “Women pay the highest price for a broken global economy”.   Globally, she pointed out, men own US$105 trillion more wealth than women—equivalent to more than four times the size of the US economy—and women earn just 51 cents for every $1 made by men.   “Women are also especially harmed by the policies that fuel our inequality crisis, like tax breaks for the rich and cuts to public services,” said Riddell, one of the authors of the Oxfam report on inequality and global corporate power.   They carry out the vast majority of unpaid care work, which is vital to keeping our communities and economies afloat, and their labor is constantly undervalued in the workplace, she noted.   “We found it would take 1,200 years for women working in the health and social sector to earn what the average CEO at the biggest Fortune 100 companies makes in just one year,” declared Riddell.   Jan. 2024   Extreme Inequality is a Human Rights Issue, by Andrew Stroehlein for Human Rights Watch   As the annual gathering of the extreme elite kicks off in Davos today, I’m reminded of an argument I often have with an old friend.   It always starts with some news item about the number of billionaires somewhere: “the US is doing great – look at the number of billionaires they have!” Or, “you can see China’s getting better by the increasing number of billionaires there.” Or, “Look at the number of billionaires in India now!”   The prospect of the world’s first trillionaire has him almost unbearably excited: “Who will it be?”   To these friendly provocations, I eventually crack and respond with something like: does humanity really need a trillionaire? In what way will the world be a better place when someone becomes the first trillionaire?   Then, I remind him that the number of super-rich people says nothing about the greatness of a country. Greatness, to me, has far more to do with the overall happiness of its population. Some say billionaires create wealth (and therefore happiness, in their eyes), but, practically by definition, it looks more like they’re hoarding it.   Vast riches have always sparked admiration among many folks like my friend, but they’ve also increased envy and resentment among others. A system perceived as unfairly benefitting a tiny few while the vast majority are essentially told to live on the scraps of what the rich leave behind doesn’t sound like a stable system to me. I don’t see any national benefit there.   What’s more, extreme inequality is a human rights issue. Among other things, it contributes to corruption and mismanagement of public resources, which further reduces access to the keys to a dignified life: affordable healthcare, quality education, adequate housing, a living wage, social protection, and safe drinking water.   Human Rights Watch research frequently exposes how people in poverty are often more vulnerable to having their rights violated. Extreme disparities in wealth mean extreme disparities in power, and thus a greater potential for human rights abuses, which, of course, tends to happen more to those without power than to those with it.   To coincide with the start of billionaires’ private jets arriving for the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Oxfam has published a new report on global inequality. It reads: “Since 2020, the richest five men in the world have doubled their fortunes. During the same period, almost five billion people globally have become poorer. Hardship and hunger are a daily reality for many people worldwide. At current rates, it will take 230 years to end poverty, but we could have our first trillionaire in 10 years.” That doesn’t sound like greatness to me.   http://www.hrw.org/topic/economic-justice-and-rights/poverty-and-inequality http://wid.world/news-article/whats-new-about-wealth-inequality-in-the-world/   # UN WebTV: UN Economic and Social Council Special meeting (March 2024) on international cooperation in tax matters - Options and approaches for fiscal measures to realise net wealth taxes in support of more inclusive and sustainable development and to advance progress toward a fair, inclusive, and effective international tax system: http://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1m/k1mmhjh8gh   * U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren with the support of numerous elected representatives, forwards legislation for a Ultra-Millionaire Tax on fortunes over $50 million: http://www.warren.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/warren-jayapal-boyle-reintroduce-ultra-millionaire-tax-on-fortunes-over-50-million   Oct. 2023   Small global billionaire tax could yield $250 billion annually, reports the EU Tax Observatory   Governments should clampdown on tax evasion by billionaires by introducing a global minimum wealth tax which could raise $250 billion annually, the EU Tax Observatory said on Monday.   If levied, the sum would be equivalent to only 2% of the nearly $13 trillion in wealth owned by the 2,700 billionaires globally, the research group hosted at the Paris School of Economics said.   Currently billionaires' effective personal tax is often far less than what other taxpayers of more modest means pay because they can park wealth in shell companies sheltering them from income tax, the group said in its 2024 Global Tax Evasion Report.   "In our view, this is difficult to justify because it undermines the sustainability of tax systems and the social acceptability of taxation," the observatory's director Gabriel Zucman told journalists.   Billionaires have been operating on the “border of legality” in using shell companies to avoid tax and the world’s wealthiest individuals should be charged a 2% levy on their wealth, the report states.   Billionaires have been pushing the limits of the law by moving certain types of income, including dividends from company shares, through dedicated holding companies that usually serve no other purpose.   “These holding companies are in a grey zone between avoidance and evasion,” the report said. “To the extent that they are created with the purpose of avoiding the income tax, they can legitimately be seen as closer to evasion.”   These types of loopholes allow the super-rich to avoid certain forms of income tax, resulting in effective tax rates worth just 0%-0.6% of their total wealth, the report found. Billionaires' personal tax in the United States is estimated to be close to just 0.5% and as low as zero in France, the Observatory estimated.   Shell companies can also stand in as nominal owners for luxury properties in expensive cities such as London. “Real estate continues to provide ample opportunities for the rich to avoid and evade taxes,” the report said.   The shell companies also fall outside the tools that have so far been used to combat tax avoidance, including the automatic exchange of banking information, which is followed by more than 100 countries.   “To date no serious attempt has been made to address this situation, which risks undermining the social acceptability of existing tax systems,” the report said.   The Observatory, which deployed more than 100 researchers to gather the report’s data, is calling on global leaders to use the next G20 summit in Brazil in November 2024 to launch talks over a global minimum 2% annual tax to be levied on the wealth – rather than the income – of the world’s richest people.   The idea is based on the 2021 agreement between 140 countries and territories to impose a global minimum tax rate of 15% on the biggest multinational companies.   Zucman said: “This is the logical next step after the global minimum tax on multinational companies – which demonstrates that it is possible for countries to agree on minimum tax rates.”   He said minimum rates were the most powerful tools to address loopholes in existing tax systems because they ensure that no matter what the avoidance measures used, the tax collected cannot fall below a set amount.   The reform is far from perfect. The search for a broad consensus led to the application of a relatively low global tax rate (rather than a base rate of 25% many recommended), accompanied by numerous exemptions that limit its scope.   Commenting on the report, Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said: “Tax evasion, and, more broadly, tax avoidance, is not inevitable; it is the result of policy choices – or the failure to make policy choices that act to stop it.”   He said that a billionaire’s tax would help governments fund important services such as education, infrastructure and technology, and soften the blow of oncoming crises, including future pandemics, and those linked to extreme weather events as a result of the climate crisis.   “So many people struggle to make ends meet yet pay the taxes their governments ask of them,” Stiglitz said. “We need to make sure those at the top of the income ladder who certainly have the financial means don’t wriggle out of them.”   The Observatory also warned about other looming risks for tax revenues, including in the area of green energy subsidies. The report explained that a race for green energy producers was resulting in much larger tax exemptions that could more than offset the gains made by the newly enforced modest 15% minimum corporate tax rate. While it has the potential to accelerate a country’s transition to zero-carbon emissions, the Observatory said it raises some of the same issues as standard tax competition.   “It depletes government revenues, and if not accompanied by egalitarian measures, it risks increasing inequality by boosting the after-tax profits of shareholders, who tend to be towards the top of the income distribution.”   In the absence of a broad international agreement for a minimum tax on billionaires, Zucman said a “coalition of willing countries” could unilaterally lead the way.   http://www.taxobservatory.eu/publication/global-tax-evasion-report-2024/ http://www.lemonde.fr/en/opinion/article/2023/10/23/keeping-up-the-pressure-to-combat-tax-evasion_6197046_23.html http://taxjustice.net/2023/10/17/joint-statement-organisations-applaud-un-committees-work-on-net-wealth-taxes/ http://taxjustice.net/press/world-to-lose-4-7-trillion-to-tax-havens-over-next-decade-unless-un-tax-convention-adopted-countries-warned/ http://taxjustice.net/reports/the-state-of-tax-justice-2023/   http://policy-practice.oxfam.org/resources/survival-of-the-richest-how-we-must-tax-the-super-rich-now-to-fight-inequality-621477/ http://www.icij.org/tags/tax-havens/ http://www.wider.unu.edu/publication/1-trillion-shade http://missingprofits.world/ http://www.icrict.com/ http://taxjustice.net/2022/09/28/to-protect-childrens-right-to-education-governments-must-fight-tax-abuse/ http://www.cesr.org/why-tax-justice-is-critical-to-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities/ http://factipanel.org/press-release/un-panel-end-financial-abuses-to-save-people-and-planet.html
	As climate threats escalate funding to support those most vulnerable is imperative by CAN International, IIED, OHCHR, agencies   Mar. 2024   The urgent need for a child-centred Loss and Damage Fund, by Cristina Coloon, Lucy Szaboova. (UNICEF, agencies)   The world’s most marginalised children are already suffering the unavoidable impacts of climate change – death, displacement, malnutrition, the loss of education, and the destruction of traditional ways of life. These consequences are collectively known as climate-related loss and damage.   Since children have their whole lives ahead of them, such losses or damages suffered at an early age can lead to a lifetime of lost opportunity and can even affect future generations. That makes loss and damage related to climate change one of the greatest intergenerational injustices facing children today, threatening the rights enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child – such as the rights to survive and thrive, to protection, to clean water and food, to education and health, and to cultural heritage and indigenous knowledge.   Children have contributed the least to the climate crisis, yet they are suffering from its impacts more acutely than any previous generation.   The world has looked to climate finance to compensate those who have suffered the most due to climate change. Unfortunately, children’s unique needs and concerns have been largely overlooked in climate finance debates, a trend also reflected in climate finance allocations.   In 2022, nations agreed to set up a dedicated Loss and Damage Fund (L&D Fund), which is not only a significant milestone in climate negotiations, but also a chance to learn from past experiences of financing climate action. In fact, it is an opportunity to deliver climate justice for children on the frontline of the climate crisis.   Children’s first-hand accounts corroborate that climate-related loss and damage is part of their everyday realities. In a new report, Loss and Damage Finance for Children, 55 children, aged between 11 and 18, from diverse geographies share their experiences of loss and damage and recount memories of missing out on schooling, the loss or damage to their family home or livelihood, and even the loss of friends and family.   The children who shared with us their experiences unanimously demanded a seat at the table where discussions and decisions about loss and damage finance allocations take place. Their experiences and words make it clear that putting children’s rights at the heart of loss and damage finance is a matter of climate justice.   While the COP28 decision to launch the new L&D Fund recognizes youth as key stakeholders to participate in and shape the design, development and implementation of activities financed by the Fund, it only mentions children twice. To date, less than 2.4 per cent of climate finance has gone towards projects incorporating activities responsive to children’s needs.   At the same time, the way climate finance works now is pushing the countries most affected by the climate crisis into a debt crisis. When countries vulnerable to climate change are locked into a vicious cycle of indebtedness, with debt accumulating in tandem with accelerating losses and damages, compromises in public spending on essential services like education and healthcare often become inevitable. This has dire implications for children’s well-being and development.   It is important that the new L&D Fund, and loss and damage finance more broadly, break away from existing climate finance approaches.   The L&D Fund is a chance to ensure that present and future generations of children can thrive and fully exercise their rights. But this requires:   Recognizing children’s unique needs and vulnerabilities; facilitating their participation in decisions about the allocation and use of funding; ensuring the equitable distribution of loss and damage finance; and restoring children’s dignity when losses and damages are unavoidable.   Above all, it requires funding – sufficient, equitable, accessible and sustainable resources for meaningfully addressing the losses and damages suffered by children and their families.   It is crucial then that children’s rights are elevated, and their voices are amplified in discussions about implementing the L&D Fund as well as in setting the new global goal on climate finance. It is essential that this goal – called the New Common Quantified Goal – not only recognizes loss and damage as a critical pillar of climate finance, but that it is informed by the needs of climate-vulnerable children. We must not miss this opportunity to deliver climate justice for children.   * Cristina Coloon is Policy Specialist, UNICEF Innocenti; Lucy Szaboova is Climate Change and Environment Research Fellow, University of Exeter.   # Read the report Loss and Damage Finance for Children by UNICEF, Save the Children, Plan International, the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) and the Loss and Damage Youth Coalition (LDYC).   http://www.unicef.org/blog/urgent-need-child-centred-loss-and-damage-fund http://www.unicef.org/innocenti/reports/loss-and-damage-finance-children http://www.endchildhoodpoverty.org/publications-feed/climatechange   Feb. 2024   Delay to establishing the board of a fund for people harmed by global warming threatens to undermine human rights. (Amnesty)   Amnesty International is urging the rapid operationalization and capitalization of the international Loss and Damage Fund meant to remedy the harms faced by communities most severely affected by climate change, after higher-income states which are primarily responsible for causing the climate crisis missed a deadline to nominate their representatives to its board.   Following the hottest year ever recorded globally the need for action is acute, but this failure to act swiftly on an agreement at the COP climate summit in November to press ahead and deliver a working Loss and Damage Fund, initially hosted by the World Bank, threatens to undermine the human rights of communities which desperately need resources to deal with the impacts of climate change.   “The full operationalization of an adequately financed Loss and Damage Fund is potentially a matter of life or death for millions of people around the world facing the most severe consequences of global warming, such as droughts, floods, rising sea levels, ocean acidification, desertification and loss of livelihoods. Delays to the disbursement of funds at the scale needed threaten the rights of people most affected by the increasing weather extremes and environmental degradation caused by our heating climate,” said Ann Harrison, Climate Justice Advisor at Amnesty International.   “‘Developed’ countries pushed back last year against the concerns of human rights advocates about the World Bank’s involvement by arguing that the bank’s hosting of the fund would help ensure its more rapid operationalization. These states got want they wanted, and yet are jeopardizing progress. Communities on the frontline of the climate crisis should not have to wait as lives and ecosystems are lost while nations which have been the largest historic emitters of greenhouse gases squabble over board seats.”   “The fact that only two women have so far been nominated to a 26-member board, despite a mandate for gender balance, is also alarming and should be remedied. Women are among those most susceptible to and worst affected by the climate crisis and should have far more equal representation in the governance of the fund.”   The fund’s board was due to hold its first meeting in January, but the continuing delay now threatens the entire 2024 timeline set out for the fund, including a June deadline for the World Bank to confirm its willingness to host it under conditions set at the last COP.   # The Loss and Damage Fund’s board is mandated to have 26 members, comprising 12 from ‘developed’ states, which bear the greatest historical responsibility for climate change caused by anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, three each from Asia-Pacific, Africa, Latin American and the Caribbean, two each from small ‘developing’ island states and ‘least developed’ countries, and one from another ‘developing’ nation not in these categories. An agreement to establish the Loss and Damage Fund was reached at COP27 in 2022. Certain parties pledged limited financing to the fund at COP28 in Dubai last year.   http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/02/global-delay-to-establishing-the-board-of-a-fund-for-people-harmed-by-global-warming-threatens-to-undermine-human-rights/ http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/01/global-hottest-year-on-record-underlines-severity-of-the-climate-crisis/ http://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-2023-hottest-year-record http://wmo.int/media/news/wmo-confirms-2023-smashes-global-temperature-record http://wmo.int/news/media-centre/rate-and-impact-of-climate-change-surges-dramatically-2011-2020 http://www.climatecentre.org/wp-content/uploads/RCCC-TEG-CRM-Key-Findings-Related-to-losses-and-damage_WIM-ExCom-V3.pdf   Dec. 2023   Climate-related extreme weather events are happening all over the world with the poorest and most marginalized the worst impacted.   Countries and communities, disproportionately those in the developing world, are being severly impacted by floods, droughts and cyclones, and suffering the consequences of a steady sea-level rise.   They are paying the price of the rich historical emitters and those who continue to expand fossil fuels, further exacerbating the crisis.   The writing is on the wall, countries have gone past the point where adaptation alone can arrest the climate impacts. Losses and damages are happening with ever growing economic and non-economic costs.   The unfortunate reality is all of this is expected to worsen because collective efforts to limit global warming are falling short.   This means that development in the global South will be further eroded, and its people, who are least responsible for the crisis, will bear the brunt of it — through displacement, loss of infrastructure, lives, and livelihoods.   Countries and communities incurring significant costs associated with climate change-induced loss and damage need and deserve as a matter of justice urgent financial support.   The world can no longer afford to delay in assisting developing countries and communities experiencing catastrophic losses and damages from climate events.   Loss and Damage Fund adopted at opening plenary of COP28 (agencies)   Delegates meeting in Dubai at the COP28 climate talks have agreed on the operationalization of a loss and damage fund intended to help compensate vulnerable countries cope with loss and damage caused by climate change.   UN Secretary-General António Guterres welcomed the agreement to operationalize the fund calling it an essential tool to deliver climate justice. He urged leaders to support the fund.   The fund has been a long-standing demand of developing nations on the frontlines of climate change coping with the ever increasing costs of the devastation caused by increasingly extreme weather events such as drought, floods, and rising seas.   The cost of loss and damage for developing countries is projected to reach $400 billion per year by 2030.   Following the agreement, a handful of countries promised contributions to the start-up phase of the fund. Germany and the United Arab Emirates committed $100 million each, followed by the United Kingdom ($50.5m), the United States ($17.5m) and Japan ($10m). EU member states, including Germany, are expected to collectively deliver at least $245m.   The relatively paltry contribution from the US – the world’s largest economy – attracted immediate criticism. Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa, called it “embarrassing".   Significantly more money will be needed to help vulnerable communities benefit from the new mechanism once it gets up and running. The fund is designed to receive contributions “from a wide variety of sources”, including grants and cheap loans from the public and private sectors, and “innovative sources”.   “Innovative sources” of finance could mean taxes on fossil fuels and financial transactions, carbon taxes on international aviation or shipping and the like. France and Kenya are set to launch a coalition at Cop28 to further develop options.   The World Bank is set to initially host the fund for four years, despite strong resistance to its involvement from developing countries and non government agencies. Developing countries have opposed the role for the World Bank, raising concerns over high costs, slow procedures and the predominant US influence on the institution. They grudgingly accepted the compromise to progress the fund, with certain conditions attached to World Bank involvement and a phase out/review of the role of the bank after four years.   All developing countries “particularly vulnerable” to the effects of climate change will be eligible to benefit from the mechanism. However, the definition of vulnerability is not detailed in the text.   Developed nations have sought to broaden the pool of donors expected to contribute to the fund, but have made limited headway. The text “urges” developed countries to provide financial resources to the fund, while other nations are only “encouraged” to do so “on a voluntary basis”.   The EU climate chief, Wopke Hoekstra, said China and petrostates like the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar should pay into the fund. Others want to broaden the donor base to countries with high-emitting economies categorised by the UN as developing nations like South Korea and Russia.   Civil society experts have said much more work lies ahead and, ultimately, the success of the fund will depend on how much money it is equipped with. The cost of loss and damage for developing countries is projected to reach $400 billion per year by 2030.   “Although rules have been agreed regarding how the fund will operate there are no hard deadlines, no targets and countries are not obligated to pay into it,” said Adow. “The most pressing issue now is to get money flowing into the fund and to the people that need it.”   Civil Society reactions: Loss and Damage Fund adopted at COP28   Harjeet Singh, Head of Global Political Strategy, Climate Action Network International:   “Amid the historic decision to operationalise the Loss and Damage Fund within a year of its establishment, addressing underlying concerns becomes critical. On one hand, rich countries have pushed for the World Bank to host this Fund under the guise of ensuring a speedy response. Conversely, they have attempted to dilute their financial obligations and resisted defining a clear finance mobilisation scale.   “The absence of a defined replenishment cycle raises serious questions about the Fund’s long-term sustainability. Therefore, a robust system, particularly integrated with the Global Stocktake process and the new climate finance goal, is needed to ensure that COP28 results in a meaningful outcome.   “The responsibility now lies with affluent nations to meet their financial obligations in a manner proportionate to their role in the climate crisis, which has been primarily driven by decades of unrestrained fossil fuel consumption and a lack of adequate climate finance delivered to the Global South.”   Tasneem Essop, Executive Director, Climate Action Network:   “A key issue to be addressed head on at this COP is that it delivers an outcome that deals with the need to justly and equitably phase out fossil fuels. We have had a record breaking year of global climate impacts and a number of alarming reports telling us that we are going in the wrong direction".   Rachel Cleetus, policy director and lead economist for the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, highlighted that we are in the midst of a climate crisis falling disproportionately on marginalised and disadvantaged people:   “The consensus recommendations for operationalizing the Loss and Damage Fund are far from perfect yet are an important step forward and should be quickly adopted at COP28. Richer nations–including the United States–must also live up to their responsibility and provide robust resources for the Fund. The needs are immense and crushing for low- and middle-income nations already reeling from billions of dollars of damages and an immense human toll from extreme climate impacts. Moving this agreement forward expeditiously will also create the space for addressing other pressing issues, including the phase out of fossil fuels which are the root cause of climate change and loss and damage.”   Andreas Sieber, Associate Director of Policy at 350.org:   “We welcome the fund, but rich countries were quick in trying to marginalize the fund by setting a very low bar for contributions. The needs of affected communities are in the hundreds of billions, not millions. This can only be the start and must be urgently followed up with significantly increased pledges.”   Landry Ninteretse Africa Director 350.org:   “The step towards operationalizing the Loss and Damage fund is a promising start to the climate talks. The urgency of the climate crisis requires that we move with speed to translate this to action and work towards the delivery of financing to communities that continue to bear the brunt of the climate crisis in the most climate-vulnerable regions. It is time for big polluters in line with their historic emissions to pay up to deliver justice to those disproportionately affected by their reliance on fossil fuels.”   Joseph Sikulu, 350.org Pacific Director:   “For a region that has already seen so much destruction due to the climate crisis, the Loss and Damage fund is crucial to ensuring our communities can move through this world with dignity. So many of our voices, leaders, and negotiators continue to fight to ensure this fund is operationalized quickly and effectively. We celebrate today’s win, but there is an elephant in the room, without a commitment to phase out fossil fuels this is an open chasm, more fossil fuels means more loss and damage. Unless high emitting nations also commit to a rapid phase-out of fossil fuels at COP28, the Loss and Damage fund will be blood money, paying for the destruction of our islands.”   Ani Dasgupta, President & CEO, World Resources Institute:   “The loss and damage fund will be a lifeline to people in their darkest hour, enabling families to rebuild their homes after disaster strikes, support farmers when their crops are wiped out and relocate those that become permanently displaced by rising seas. This outcome was hard-fought but is a clear step forward.   “The success of this fund will depend on the speed and scale at which funds start flowing to people in need. We call on world leaders to announce substantial contributions at Cop28 – not only to cover start-up costs but also to fill the fund itself. People in vulnerable countries will face up to $580bn in climate-related damages in 2030 and this number will only continue to grow.”   Fanny Petitbon, head of advocacy for Care France:   “Today is a landmark day for climate justice, but clearly not the end of the fight. We hope the agreement will result in rapid delivery of support for communities on the frontlines of the climate crisis. However, it has many shortcomings. It enables historical emitters to evade their responsibility. It also fails to establish the scale of finance needed and ensure that the fund is anchored in human rights principles.   “The loss and damage fund must not remain an empty promise. We urgently call on all governments who are most responsible for the climate emergency and have the capacity to contribute to announce significant pledges in the form of grants. Historical emitters must lead the way. Financial commitments must not be about robbing Peter to pay Paul: funding must be new and additional.”   Mariana Paoli, Christian Aid’s global advocacy lead:   “The fact that the World Bank is to be the interim host of the fund is a worry for developing countries. It needs to be closely scrutinised to ensure vulnerable communities are able to get easy and direct access to funds and the whole operation is run with far more transparency than the World Bank normally operates on. These were the conditions agreed by countries and if they are not kept to, a separate arrangement will be needed.   “It’s now vital we see the fund filled. People who have contributed the least to the climate crisis are already suffering climate losses and damages. The longer they are forced to wait for financial support to cover these costs, the greater the injustice. At Cop28 we need to see significant new and additional pledges of money to the loss and damage fund, and not just repackaged climate finance that has already been committed.”   http://climatenetwork.org/2023/11/30/historic-loss-and-damage-fund-adopted-at-opening-plenary-of-cop28/ http://350.org/press-release/cop28-350-org-responds-to-agreement-for-loss-and-damage-fund/ http://news.un.org/en/story/2023/11/1144162 http://wmo.int/news/media-centre/2023-shatters-climate-records-major-impacts http://www.socialprotectionfloorscoalition.org/2023/12/cop28-global-coalition-for-social-protection-floors-calls-for-building-social-protection-systems-to-deal-with-loss-and-damage/ http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/11/global-initial-pledges-at-cop28-to-finance-the-loss-damage-fund-fall-far-short-of-what-is-needed/ http://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/new-climate-and-tax-taskforce-must-make-rich-polluters-pay http://thebulletin.org/2023/12/cop28-creates-fund-for-vulnerable-countries-for-loss-and-damage-from-climate-change-but-will-it-reach-vulnerable-people/ http://sites.udel.edu/climatechangehub/rising-global-economic-lossdamage-report2023/   * Loss & Collaboration News (30/11):   http://www.lossanddamagecollaboration.org/link-page/loss-and-damage-collaboration-l-dc-master-document-for-cop-28 http://larutadelclima.org/english/reparations/ http://www.germanclimatefinance.de/2023/11/29/making-the-loss-and-damage-fund-operational-and-adequately-equipped-key-tasks-for-cop28/ http://climateanalytics.org/comment/safeguards-and-exit-points-for-the-world-bank-as-host-of-the-loss-and-damage-fund http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/29/why-loss-and-damage-funds-are-key-to-climate-justice-for-developing-countries-at-cop28 http://www.context.news/climate-justice/opinion/community-voices-are-essential-for-a-just-loss-and-damage-fund http://genevasolutions.news/climate-environment/why-loss-damage-fund-alone-will-not-redress-climate-harm http://www.development-today.com/archive/2023/dt-8--2023/loss-and-damage-fund-could-make-or-break-cop28.-the-presidency-aims-for-an-early-win-dt-is-told http://www.context.news/climate-justice/opinion/its-time-to-put-our-money-where-our-mouths-are http://news.mongabay.com/2023/11/climate-loss-damage-fund-the-furthest-thing-imaginable-from-a-success/ http://www.lossanddamagecollaboration.org/news   Oct. 2023   170 Humanitarian, Climate and Development organisations issue a joint call to demand Loss and Damage Funding:   In an era marked by the increasingly palpable ramifications of climate change, the interplay between its impacts and humanitarian crises has intensified.   Marginalised and vulnerable communities in the developing countries, despite their minimal contribution to climate adversities, find themselves grappling not only with the direct climatic and environmental consequences of climate change but also with a myriad of pre-existing humanitarian and developmental challenges.   These communities are also confronting both historical and systemic inequalities, underscoring the urgent need for climate justice.   At COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh in 2022, a landmark agreement was forged, establishing a fund and funding arrangements to provide crucial financial support to address loss and damage.   It is vital for the humanitarian, development, peace, human rights, and climate communities to operate in tandem. Their unified voice is crucial in ensuring the delivery of loss and damage finance to the affected communities.   By fostering collaboration, we can secure a more holistic, comprehensive, and effective approach, reinforcing our commitment to safeguarding the rights, protection, dignity, and livelihoods of those most affected by the multifaceted challenges of climate change.   We are witnessing and enduring the repercussions of human-induced climate change everywhere, yet the impacts are disproportionately burdening those least responsible for causing the climate crisis, and it is only poised to worsen.   The scale, frequency, and duration of climate-related extreme weather events are escalating, presenting new challenges due to slow onset processes such as sea level rise, loss of biodiversity, and the accelerating pace of desertification, all of which demand attention.   While communities, domestic responders, and humanitarians are at the frontlines of this crisis, the overwhelming and escalating needs far surpass their capacities to absorb and recover from shocks. Moreover, the existing humanitarian financing system is ill-equipped to adequately respond to multiple and compounding climate impacts.   To address both economic and non-economic loss and damage arising from slow-onset processes and rapid-onset events, there is a need for a substantial increase in finance and in national capacities, through the Loss and Damage Fund, which can be accessed by countries and communities promptly.   This is crucial to prevent communities from unjustly suffering the current, immediate, and prolonged ill-effects of human-induced climate change. Consequently, additional resources are essential to address loss and damage, thereby complementing the role played by the humanitarian system.   We are joining together to support the urgent calls for loss and damage finance under the UNFCCC based on four priorities: access, adequacy, additionality, and accountability.   Access: All developing countries necessitate and are entitled to loss and damage finance based on the principles of equity, justice and human rights. Special attention must be accorded to ensure that particularly marginalised and climate-vulnerable communities and individuals, on the frontline today and in the future, are able to access the loss and damage finance they need, as directly as possible.   This must align with Grand Bargain commitments on localisation. Access should also be flexible, multi-year, timely, transparent, equitable and administratively light in the context of rapid-onset and slow-onset impacts.   Adequacy: Climate change is indisputably costly, with the annual costs already amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars in developing countries. As the frequency, scale, and duration of climate-induced extreme weather events and impacts of slow-onset events escalate, more and more people will continue to be affected in ways that surpass their capacity to fully recover from these recurrent calamities.   Therefore, substantial financial resources are not merely desirable; they are essential. This includes fulfilling commitments for new and additional climate finance and addressing the shortfall in humanitarian finance. It is crucial that loss and damage finance is appropriately scaled to fully cover both the economic and non-economic costs of rehabilitation and reconstruction for affected communities.   As climate threats escalate, prioritising substantial, timely, and accessible funding to support those most vulnerable to climate change is more than a moral duty – it’s an existential imperative.   This is the year in which governments must unite to formally establish and provide adequate funding for a Loss and Damage Facility for communities unjustly affected by climate change. We stand in solidarity with them, unified as humanitarian, development, peace, human rights, and climate communities in our urgent call.   http://climatenetwork.org/2023/10/12/humanitarian-climate-and-development-organisations-issue-a-joint-call-to-demand-the-loss-and-damage-fund/ http://caneurope.org/content/uploads/2023/10/Public-sources-climate-finance-loss-and-damage.pdf http://www.carbonbrief.org/qa-the-fight-over-the-loss-and-damage-fund-for-climate-change/ http://unctad.org/publication/taking-responsibility-towards-fit-purpose-loss-and-damage-fund http://climateanalytics.org/press-releases/oil-and-gas-majors-could-have-paid-for-their-share-of-climate-loss-and-damage-and-still-earned-10-trillion-usd-new-report http://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news/2023/11/06/history-made-terms-agreed-loss-and-damage-fund-cop28 http://insideclimatenews.org/news/03112023/loss-and-damage-talks-cast-shadow-on-climate-conference/ http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/03/un-climate-crisis-talks-resume-loss-damage-funding-poorest-countries   http://climatenetwork.org/2023/08/29/new-loss-and-damage-fund-must-deliver-climate-justice/ http://www.iied.org/tackling-loss-damage-vulnerable-countries-improving-evidence-co-generating-pathways-impact http://www.iied.org/21891iied http://www.lossanddamagecollaboration.org/publication/the-loss-and-damage-finance-landscape http://taxonslessuperprofits.carefrance.org/en/ http://www.escr-net.org/news/2023/addressing-loss-and-damage-our-call-accountability-and-justice http://www.ciel.org/loss-and-damage-fund-tc1/   * Nov. 2023: United Nations Conference on Trade and Development report: Towards a Fit for Purpose Loss & Damage Fund. Chapter 3: Innovative sources of financing for funding Loss and Damage: http://unctad.org/publication/taking-responsibility-towards-fit-purpose-loss-and-damage-fund http://www.unocha.org/roadmap-cop28   Dec. 2022   Rich nations can afford to pay their fair share to fix global crises, by Lidy Nacpil, Thuli Makama. (Thompson Reuters Foundation)   Will rich countries pay international climate reparations? Vanuatu first asked this question in 1991, and by 2013 the U.S. response was still a firm no. As State Department Climate Envoy Todd Stern put it, “The fiscal reality of the United States and other developed countries is not going to allow it.”   Throughout most of 2022, Stern’s successor John Kerry had a nearly identical response, saying, “there is not enough money in any country in the world to actually solve climate change. It takes trillions and no government that I know of is ready to put trillions into this." His counterparts in other wealthy governments held similar positions.   But the COP27 climate summit in November forced a change of script. Channelling frustration with the uneven impacts of the last few years of the pandemic, climate chaos and the energy crisis, Global South social movements made this the summit’s headline issue.   This helped cement unprecedented unity among the developing-country negotiating bloc and forced wealthy countries to agree to establish a ‘loss and damage’ fund to address escalating climate impacts. It was an important breakthrough in an otherwise disappointing summit, in which language on a just fossil-fuel phase out - notably the most critical measure to limit the amount of loss and damage - was excluded from the final text.   There is still a struggle ahead to ensure that rich nations fill this new fund with anything near their fair share of what is needed to respond to climate disasters. What is not in question is whether they can afford to.   Fossil fuel wealth   Wealthy governments control international financial systems and their domestic economies. We saw them make trillions of dollars in fiscal space available for bank bailouts in 2008 and for COVID-19 responses since 2020. And each year, they find trillions for militaries and fossil fuel subsidies. It is in this context that proposals to redistribute significant public funding to address overlapping global crises are gaining momentum.   The first is making fossil fuel companies pay. While many households were pushed into poverty this year, oil and gas companies made record profits and governments continued to subsidise them. Ending fossil fuel subsidies would raise at least $600 billion a year, and a 10% tax hike on oil and gas production about $400 billion in 2022. Along these lines, the EU and UK among others have introduced windfall taxes on oil and gas profits, and U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres and small island governments are calling for part of these to be levied toward the loss and damage fund.   There is also momentum to shift a particularly influential form of fossil subsidy - international public finance - towards renewable energy instead.   Second, a small tax on extreme wealth would raise $2.5 trillion a year, and related proposals to crack down on tax dodging would significantly bolster this. Because the world’s richest 1% have caused 23% of greenhouse gas emissions growth since 1990, these measures are also needed to reach climate targets.   In a push that mirrored the loss and damage win, last week African countries secured a key step towards these reforms by passing a resolution for the U.N. to hold its own intergovernmental talks on tax rules rather than them remaining the sole domain of the OECD.   Calls to cancel Global South countries’ sovereign debts predate the climate crisis but are intensifying with it. Campaigners brought these asks to COP27, pointing out that low-income countries are forced to pay wealthier countries the initial $100 billion a year they have been promised in climate finance many times over in debt service payments.   The economic volatility of the last few years has compounded debts in many countries, preventing public spending on basic needs, let alone climate action. In response, some governments and agencies are finally making serious debt proposals like cancelling $100 billion a year for the next decade.   Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley’s popular Bridgetown Agenda to tackle debt and climate has components of these proposals, as well as an ask for the International Monetary Fund to inject at least $650-billion worth of reserve assets into struggling economies annually through Special Drawing Rights. Together, these modest proposals add up to well over $3.7 trillion a year.   * Lidy Nacpil is coordinator of the Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD) and Thuli Makama is Oil Change International’s Africa Director.   http://www.context.news/climate-justice/opinion/rich-nations-can-afford-to-pay-fair-share-to-fix-global-crises http://inweh.unu.edu/opinion-cop-27-a-global-cop-out/ http://geopolitique.eu/en/articles/breaking-the-deadlock-on-climate-the-bridgetown-initiative/ http://www.unocha.org/news/loss-and-damage-fund-last-win-details http://actionaid.org/news/2023/new-loss-and-damage-fund-must-deliver-equitable-outcome-climate-ravaged-countries-says http://www.sei.org/publications/finance-loss-damage-principles-modalities/ http://www.gi-escr.org/publications/white-paper-loss-and-damage-the-missing-piece-international-tax-cooperation-for-new-climate-finance http://wid.world/news-article/climate-inequality-report-2023-fair-taxes-for-a-sustainable-future-in-the-global-south/ http://mediacentre.christianaid.org.uk/new-report-top-10-climate-disasters-cost-the-world-billions-in-2022/ http://public.wmo.int/en/media/news/tropical-cyclone-freddy-may-set-new-record http://theconversation.com/au/topics/loss-and-damage-23218 http://www.un.org/en/climatechange/adelle-thomas-loss-and-damage   Oct. 2022   Climate change the greatest threat the world has ever faced, UN expert warns. (OHCHR)   Human-induced climate change is the largest, most pervasive threat to the natural environment and societies the world has ever experienced, and the poorest countries are paying the heaviest price, a UN expert said.   “Throughout the world, human rights are being negatively impacted and violated as a consequence of climate change. This includes the right to life, health, food, development, self-determination, water and sanitation, work, adequate housing and freedom from violence, trafficking and slavery,” said Ian Fry, UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights in the context of climate change, in a report to the General Assembly.   “There is an enormous injustice being manifested by developed economies against the poorest and least able to cope. Inaction by developed economies and major corporations to take responsibility for drastically reducing their greenhouse gas emissions has led to demands for ‘climate reparations’ for losses incurred. The G20 members for instance, account for 78 per cent of emissions over the last decade.”   The Special Rapporteur’s report focuses on the topics of mitigation action, loss and damage, access and inclusion, and the protection of climate rights defenders.   “The overall effect of inadequate actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is creating a human rights catastrophe, and the costs of these climate change related disasters are enormous,” Fry said.   Those most affected and suffering the greatest losses are the least able to participate in current decision-making and more must be done to ensure they have a say in their future, including children and youth, women, persons with disabilities, indigenous peoples and minorities.   Fry also raised deep concern about climate rights defenders. “As groups and communities become increasingly frustrated with the lack of action on climate change, they have turned to protests and public interventions to bear witnesses to the climate emergency. Sadly, we are seeing many climate rights defenders persecuted by governments and security organisations. Some defenders have even been killed.”   The expert emphasised that indigenous peoples, in particular, have been the target of serious attacks and human rights abuses.   Fry presented several recommendations to the General Assembly, including the establishment of a consultative group of finance experts to define the modalities and rules for the operation of a Loss and Damage Finance Facility, and a climate change redress and grievance mechanism to allow vulnerable communities to seek recourse for damages incurred.   http://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/a77226-promotion-and-protection-human-rights-context-climate-change http://www.lossanddamagecollaboration.org/publication/cost-of-delay-why-finance-to-address-loss-and-damage-must-be-agreed-at-cop27 http://thecvf.org/tag/loss-and-damage/ http://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/189-million-people-year-affected-extreme-weather-developing-countries-rich-countries
	View more stories