Transcript
ANNA POWLES: So this is very much the focus of his visit, to really emphasise and support Pacific leadership on climate change and ocean governance, advocacy and the importance of tapping into indigenous mechanisms in response to climate change. In each country that he's visiting Guterres will be meeting with both government leaders, civil society, youth groups to hear how people are being impacted by climate change, but also to talk about what successful and meaningful climate action looks like in these countries too. And this is really important because it's coming off the back of this week's meeting in Fiji, of the forum economic ministers meeting hosted by the Pacific Island forums where key issues are issues like the proposed Pacific resilience facility, which is all about resilience in response to climate change, mitigating climate change through upfront investment, and to really try and reduce those recovery costs. So Guterres' visit really dovetails nicely with that, and then of course there are some other issues that he's going to be wanting to talk about too: building processes in the in the Pacific region, Bougainville with the upcoming referendum in October - obviously, the UN is heavily involved in that process as well. And so climate change, though, will really be at the forefront of this visit with the upcoming climate action summit.
DON WISEMAN: The Pacific of course has been right at the forefront. It's been driving harder on climate change than any other part of the world. Is Mr Guterres in complete harmony, is he in tune with them?
AP: Certainly from the statements made, absolutely. And there is a strong recognition that the Pacific Islands leaders and countries have, as you say, been at the forefront of driving this conversation and driving for change in action on climate issues. And the UN recognises that. Obviously the UN is only as strong as its member states. And having the Pacific Island leaders so vocal and so strong on that is critical. Obviously, the role of Australia and New Zealand is also important in that space too. And Guterres will be visiting New Zealand. He won't be visiting Australia, although there will be an Australian representative at that meeting next week in Suva on the Wednesday.
DW: Pacific leaders very rarely get together outside of the Forum meetings. And as we say most of them are going to be in Suva next week at the Forum Secretariat building, what are they going to be hoping will come out of it?
AP: There's a lot of speculation among media and others that a significant climate statement might come out of it. Now, whether or not that will come out of it, given the fact that the Pacific Islands Forum leaders meeting is in August and not that far away, would they necessarily want to pre-empt that? I'm not sure. But having Guterres there provides a real spotlight. The statement out about the meeting refers to it as an historic high level meeting with Guterres there. What I think is particularly interesting too is what is also happening on the margins of that. Fiji's Prime Minister Bainimarama is going to be at that meeting and he said that he will also be at the (Forum) leaders meeting in Tuvalu in August as well. And so what we're seeing too is Fiji very much coming back into the fold at the very senior level. We know that the foreign minister and defence minister attended (recent Forum leaders summits) on Bainimarama's behalf, but we're seeing a more active Fiji in this space as well and that's fairly significant, particularly too as Fiji is apparently quite keen on hosting the Forum for its 50th anniversary next year in Fiji too. So there are some side jostling as well. And this is also a good opportunity to address some of these issues, having a clear statement on these issues - a Pacific consensus - before getting to the Forum leaders meeting in August too.
