Prime Minister, Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif has asked the Inter-Parliamentary Union to play its role in raising awareness about the horrors of climate change and help mobilize global support for the developing countries facing the climate crisis due to global warming. According to the Prime Minister, climate change has emerged as one of the most potent challenges facing the world. During his meeting with the President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), Shehbaz Sharif told Duarte Pacheco that Pakistan was experiencing climate-induced floods, and the massive economic damage on top of the economic crisis had undermined the country’s efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Prime Minister asked the international community to step forward and help Pakistan deal with the calamity of epic proportions.
Global warming has become the most destructive phenomenon in the present-day world while its lethality has caused several times greater damage to the world than caused by the nuclear explosions of Nagasaki and Hiroshima during world war II. Although the world is fully aware of the catastrophe yet it could not get due importance to the major nations of the world. Despite the fact, that developed nations have a major role in the creation of this havoc but this highly sensitive issue is being handled causally by the western nations and the rest of the developed world.
The reports suggest that the impact of global warming became visible during the early 1960s and every other decade witnessed more extreme weather conditions than the previous one, while the 2010s was the hottest decade in history. Today, the weather which had been a messenger of a pleasant change in living conditions, the birth of new vegetation, and a new mellow has become a symbol of uncertainty, fear, and economic problems, due to the upheavals created by industrialization. Presently, the entire world including North America, Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania even the uninhabited continent of Antarctica is facing drastic effects of climate change, while human and sea life confront an existential threat from rising temperature.
Presently, an unpleasant situation has been created by some developed nations who do not fulfill their commitments regarding the global climate agenda under Paris Accord because they are not effecting substantially from global warming. This trend has been denounced by the UN Secretary-General during his recent visit to Pakistan’s flood-hit areas. Antonio Guterres categorically called on the developed nations, particularly those who contributed to Global warming to assist the most vulnerable Asian and African nations in averting the disastrous effects of extreme weather.
In fact, high temperature is a life-threatening hazard for all creatures in the universe and equally affects all nations across the globe in one or another way. It is a collective risk and no nation should desist from joining global efforts for the preservation of nature. Although United Nations is urging nations around the globe to feel their responsibilities, however, this highly politicized and evenly divided forum is less likely to achieve this goal. While the role of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) has become more important in building consensus and fulfilling obligations by the world nations in the present scenario. Hence, IPU Chief should convene an urgent meeting of the parliamentarians of the forum to mobilize the global community in the ongoing campaign against climate change.
