Vanuatu says it may sue fossil fuel companies and other countries over climate change

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

Vanuatu says it may sue fossil fuel companies and other countries over climate change

Vanuatu says it is desperate for financial assistance to deal with extreme weather and global warming

Lisa Cox
Thu 22 Nov 2018 07.00 GMT

The Republic of Vanuatu says it will explore whether it can take legal action against fossil fuel companies and countries for their role in causing climate change.

The Pacific nation says it is growing desperate for financial assistance to deal with the loss and damage it is increasingly experiencing due to extreme weather and global warming.

In a statement on Thursday to the Climate Vulnerable Forum, an international summit focused on those most at risk to the effects of climate change, Vanuatu’s foreign minister, Ralph Regenvanu, said he was putting the fossil fuel industry “and the states that sponsor it on notice that the climate loss and damages ravaging Vanuatu will not go unchallenged”.

“My government is now exploring all avenues to utilise the judicial system in various jurisdictions – including under international law – to shift the costs of climate protection back onto the fossil fuel companies, the financial institutions and the governments that actively and knowingly created this existential threat to my country,” he said.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/22/vanuatu-says-it-may-sue-fossil-fuel-companies-and-other-countries-over-climate-change

[msongs]

1. does anybody there use petroleum based products? nt

[Soleta]

2. The people responsible for climate change are the ones who burn petroleum.

US citizens are the worst offenders, per capita. I wonder if we'll get sued.

[defacto7]

3. I agree that the users are greatly resposible

and I hope the US and others are sued even if only to make a point. But the fossil fuel industry has covered up climate change research and data for years and are to blame for what populations and governments know and act upon. It has had a great effect on anti man made climate change attitudes leading to propaganda to support the industry and undermine science. I think the blame sits directly at the doorstep of the fossil fuel industry. The users and deniers are complicit.

[Soleta]

4. How did private companies prevent you from reading good science?

I could see this argument if we had nationalized oil companies and no private universities, but I think it is pretty weak to say that an oil company, tobacco company or pharma company controls science, media and voters. No one is dumb enough to think that the best source of accurate information about the downsides to a corporate product is the corporation itself.

[defacto7]

5. Welcome to DU...

Unfortunately I can't answer a reply that doesn't follow the basics of the comment, e.g. your added assumptions and assertions.

Try again.

[Soleta]

6. You asserted that oil companies "covered up"

Last edited Sun Nov 25, 2018, 02:08 AM - Edit history (1)

the science, as if the people burning the oil couldn't find another source of information about the climate effects.