Tributes pour in to Marshallese “climate hero” Tony de Brum

Marshall Islands climate ambassador Tony de Brum died aged 72 on Tuesday at his home in Majuro, surrounded by family.

Tony de Brum at the 2015 Paris climate summit.

As former foreign minister, he led negotiations for a tough 1.5C global warming limit at the 2015 Paris climate summit. This was crucial to give his low-lying island home a chance of survival amid rising sea levels, he argued.

Having witnessed the harm wreaked by US nuclear bomb tests on Bikini atoll as a child, de Brum was also a lifelong campaigner for reparations and disarmament.

The country’s president Hilda Heine announced his death “with great sadness and a very heavy heart”.

Read Megan Darby’s ClimateHome story - “Tributes pour in to Marshallese “climate hero” Tony de Brum.”

Marshall Islands seek regular UN climate summit

Last week, the Marshall Islands released plans for a UN climate summit of world leaders every five years.

The summit would be based on the 2014 New York summit led by Ban Ki-moon, during which US President Barack Obama introduced a new Climate Pact.

RMI President Hilda Heine said: “These summits should then become a regular fixture every five years as part of the Paris ambition mechanism as countries finish work on their targets for the next cycle.”

Read the ClimateAction story - “Marshall Islands demand regular UN climate meeting for world leaders.”

'Turnbull Government still doesn't get it' - RenewEconomy

In the final, frantic, virtually sleepless hours in Paris before the global climate deal was finalised on Saturday, Australia found itself on the outer of a powerful international movement.

Canada, once joined at the hip with Australia as one of the developed world’s two “climate dunces”, signed up to the Coalition for High Ambition – a 100-strong grouping of countries pushing for an ambitious climate treaty that sought to limit global warming to 1.5°C.

Then came Brazil, breaking away from its traditional allies India and China to declare that “if you want to tackle climate change, you need ambition and political will.”

It was not a formal voting block, but its influence in the final days of the talks was critical. This was acknowledged by the cheers in the plenary session on the final day of the Paris talks when Marshall Islands foreign minister Tony de Brum walked in at the head of his coalition colleagues.

Read the RenewEconomy story - “Lomborg legacy: Why Turnbull Coalition still doesn’t get it.”

Australia belatedly joins the 'coalition of ambition' in Paris

Australia has belatedly joined a “coalition of ambition” in the Paris climate talks – a loose grouping of more than 100 developed and developing countries including the US, EU, Canada and Brazil – aimed at countering a push by China, India and Saudi Arabia to water down aspects of the climate pact as negotiations run overtime.

Tony de Brum, foreign minister of the tiny Marshall Islands, and a founder of the new alliance, insisted Australia had not yet joined, and Australia was not represented at a press conference to announce new members – which also include Brazil, Switzerland, Iceland, the Philippines, the Seychelles, Luxembourg and Canada.

Read The Guardian story - “Australia belatedly joins 'coalition of ambition' at Paris climate talks.”

Bill Shorten's at climate change frontline - the Marshall Islands

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his really is the frontline of climate change.

Marshall Islands is a fascinating place.

It has a history of master mariners and 2000-year-old stick charts that are roadmaps of the sea with sticks indicating currents like roads. Because of Marshall Islanders’ connection with the US, there is an extensive diaspora, but that also means the island of Ebeye, which is connected to Kwajalein Atoll, is more densely populated than Manhattan – 15,000 people on around 80 acres (or about 32 hectares).

While visiting Marshall Islands, we met with representatives from the International Organization for Migration working on their climate adaptation, disaster risk reduction and education (CADRE) program. This is a program aimed at building resilience for approximately 10,000 school-aged students at up to 50 locations.

Read Bill Shorten’s story in The Labor Herald - “In Bill’s words: climate change in the Marshall Islands.”

Marshall Islands set ambitious target, calls on Australia to match it

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t might be one of the world's smallest countries but the Marshall Islands has set an ambitious target to cut its greenhouse gas emissions - and it wants Australia to do the same.

In a submission to the United Nations climate change negotiations, the tiny Pacific Island nation has vowed to cut its emissions by 32 per cent from 2010 levels by 2025.

The Climate Institute says if the Marshalls' target was replicated by Australia it would translate to a 35 per cent cut to emissions from 2005 levels by 2025.

That is higher than the spread of post-2020 targets the Abbott government is reportedly considering for its UN submission, which is expected to emerge in August ahead of the major conference in Paris late this year, at which it is hoped a new global climate deal will be signed.

Read the story by Age environment editor, Tom Arup - “Marshall Islands urge Australia to follow its ambitious climate goals”.

'Climate change is here' - Tony de Brum, Marshall Islands Foreign Minister

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esidents of the Marshall Islands capital Majuro are recovering after a powerful storm damaged houses and smashed boats on Friday, as an unseasonal typhoon brewed nearby.

Marshall Islands Foreign
 Minister,Tony de Brum -
 "climate change is
here" he tweeted.

The system was upgraded to a tropical storm on Saturday afternoon and named Nangka.

Majuro Atoll's normally calm lagoon was turned into a cauldron of high waves on Friday, ripping fishing vessels and yachts from their moorings and smashing them on to reefs.

High winds tore roofs from houses, knocked down trees and caused a power outage affecting half the city which is home to about 25,000 people.

Marshall Islands foreign minister Tony de Brum had just returned from a United Nations climate conference in New York when he faced the damaging, unseasonal storm.

"My family home battered by the beginnings of yet another cyclone. Climate change has arrived," he tweeted.

Read the ABC story - “Chaotic unseasonal storms strike Marshall Islands and Guam as eight systems threaten western Pacific”.

The truth is to be found in what action is taken, rather than what is said

The adage that we should not listen to what people say, rather watch what they do is truly applicable to the climate change conversation.

Marshall Islands Foreign
 Minister, Tony de Brum.

Australia stands at the head of the queue on this charge.

The rest of the world, in particular smaller Pacific nations, hear what is being articulated by PM Tony Abbott and his coalition cohort including Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, but watch stunned as it dismantles Australia’s climate change mitigation infrastructure.

In a story headed: “Marshall Islands calls on Australia to rethink climate change stance”, the ABC reports that the Marshall Islands has joined other Pacific nations in calling on Australia to reconsider its position on climate change.

Interestingly Minister Bishop, who attended the conference in Apia, told the ABC Australia was taking strong and effective action on climate change.

"We know that climate change is an issue of importance to small island developing states," she said.

"We know that they are among the most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change.

"Our direct action plan is investing over $2.5 billion in an emissions reduction fund which will help achieve (reduction) targets.

"We're working constructively, domestically and internationally, to ensure that all major economies play their fair part in global action."

While what she says sounds positive and encouraging, what is happening here is quite different with the government doing all it can to ignore climate change, disassemble whatever protections existed and taking the country down a path contrary to what is needed if the impacts of a changing climate are to be avoided.