Rising seas; "Small Islands - Big Impact"

Wasantha RAMANAYAKE

Threat to human lives posed by rising sea level due to climate change is also an issue of right to life says Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed in a newly released film "Small Islands - Big Impact."

"We have a fundamental right for life. If that is challenged, we have to link it to be a human rights issue, and not just an environmental issue," the President had told director of the film Nalaka Gunawardane in an interview which formed the basis to the film.

In the short new film released online for the International Day of Climate Action on October 24, 2009, President Nasheed said that the global warming and climate change were both a global human rights issue and a security threat to small, low-lying island nations such as the Maldives.

The President says that scientists projected sea level rise in terms of different scenarios. He told that in terms of any of these scenarios small Islands such as Maldives would go under water in no time.

"This is a very real threat to us," President Nasheed cautioned. "We will die if this goes on!" He noted that democracy and good governance are vital elements in humanity's struggle against climate change.

Otherwise, he added, when the actual impacts of the climate changes are felt, all the resources would be wasted in the absence of democracy and good governance.

He further explained that traditional adaptation methods to climate change such physical structures as revetments, embankments and breakwaters, etc. would not be enough. "But we feel that the most important adaptation issue is good governance therefore, consolidating democracy is very important for adaptation," the President said. Climate induced pressures are already affecting fisheries and tourism, the two most important sectors of the Maldivian economy, President Nasheed said.

"Even now, some islanders have to move homes from where they lived to elsewhere. There are serious coastal erosion problems. So that's all very real, and it's happening now," he added.

Commenting on the "Sovereign Wealth Fund," launched by the President when assumed office in November 2008, for relocating Maldivian people in another country, President Nasheed said that it has been formulated and it is growing. "We will have to save for a rainy day," he noted.The president in a strong message to the Copenhagen climate summit noted that the damage has been already done; "there is no point in pointing fingers," he argued.