"The next great refugee crisis will be caused due to climate change.

"

The news is filled with images of disasters, tsunamis, earthquakes & floods. But after the cameras
leave, what happens to the millions of people who are forced to leave their homes as a result of
these natural disasters. Today more people are more exposed to more extreme weather and on top
of that there is weaker governance and violence. These ‘climatic refugees’ do have a right to be
relocated as they did not cause the climate change which has forced them out of their homes.
Instead, the developed and industrialized nations [Global North Countries], who are the major
contributors to climate change are still either in denial [President Trump pulling out of the Paris
climate agreement] or wouldn’t be taking responsibility for contributing the brunt of the carbon to
the atmosphere.

Currently, natural disasters displace an average of 21.5 million people every year worldwide. The
number of extremely hot days we face today, have already doubled since the 1970’s and during this
century it is expected to increase even further. Instead of about 15 such days each year, this number
is expected to reach 80 days per year by 2050. Climate change is not something that is going to
affect us in the future. It is already happening as we speak. In the words of Dominica's Prime
Minister, Dr Roosevelt Skerrit, “To Deny Climate Change is to Procrastinate While the Earth Sinks”.

Taking the case of Ioane Teitiota, who was born on Tabiteuea atoll, one of the 33 tiny islands
scattered across a vast expanse of the central Pacific that belong to the Republic of Kiribati, is a
contender to become the world’s first climate refugee, albeit an accidental one. The argument goes
that Teitiota can’t return home because the coming deluge not only threatens Kiribati, but the
health and safety of him, his wife, and their three young children.

The guiding document of international refugee law, the 1951 UN Convention [Geneva] on the status
of refugees, defines them as people who have left their home country and can’t return because of a
“well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a
particular social group or political opinion.” The fact that people are fleeing because they cannot
grow crops on their land anymore or because it doesn’t rain anymore does not offer them
protection as refugees under this convention. Neither does rising sea levels, droughts, and severe
superstorms don’t fit into that definition.

Therefore, we need to give people hope, no matter in which corner of the Earth they are, in their
situation of extreme vulnerability. Else, there would be severe consequences for not dealing with the
upcoming crisis for us all.