Ban Ki-Moon Talks Climate Change In Australia

SYDNEY — United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday that urgent action was needed on climate change, pointing to the famine in the Horn of Africa and devastating floods in northern Australia as examples of the suffering caused by global warming.

Ban lashed out at climate change skeptics during a speech at the University of Sydney, arguing that science has proven climate change is real.
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"Watching this high tide standing on the shore of Kiribati, I said, 'High tide shows it's high time to act,'" Ban said. "We are running out of time."
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Drought and conflict in the Horn of Africa have left millions of lives at risk, and extreme weather events such as severe flooding that devastated northern Australia earlier this year will only grow more frequent as climate change accelerates, Ban warned.

"This is a global race to save the planet," he said.

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CHRIS UHLMANN: Isn't the only thing that matters in the end though results, and if we take just one thing, climate change, since 1992, in fact since the Kyoto Protocol, we've seen the world's carbon footprint grow?

BAN KI-MOON: It's true that we have not been able to agree on a globally acceptable comprehensive agreement. We have been working very hard. We must have a legally binding global agreement. Now member states have not been forthcoming yet. But it is also encouraging that many member states, individually, taking their own steps to use more renewable sources of energy and to take more mitigation efforts and to adapt.

UN chief urges world to redouble efforts on ... JPost - Headlines

Ban, winding up a visit to Australia and small Pacific nations including several likely to be swamped by rising sea levels, said critics of climate change science were wrong.

"The facts are clear. Global greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise. Millions of people are suffering today from climate impacts. Climate change is very real," Ban said in a speech at Sydney University.

"Environmental migrants are starting to reshape the human geography of the planet. This will only increase as sea-levels rise and deserts advance. We cannot burn our way to the future," he said.

AFP: Sustainable development world's top issue: UN chief

SYDNEY — United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon singled out sustainable development as the top issue facing the planet with the world's seven billionth person expected to be born next month.

Key to this was climate change, and he said time was running out with the population set to explode this century.
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He suggested the doubters take a trip to Kiribati.

"Look into the eyes of the young boy who told me: 'I am afraid to sleep at night' because of the rising water," he said.

"Talk with the parents who told me how they stood guard fearing that their children might drown in their own homes when the tide came in."