 What's happening with human rights around our world on Think Tech Live, broadcasts from our downtown studio in Honolulu, Hawaii, and Juan, and Nuiakea. Today, we're at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, Conference of Parties 28 session, and we're looking at the most important basic human rights that illustrate the interconnectedness of the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment. We're looking at the right to freedom of movement in residence, Article 13, The Human Right to Return to One's Homeland. We're exploring the existential climate change crisis with a Pacific perspective from COP 1 in Berlin to COP 28 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Today, we're joined by Rex. Rex, thank you so much for participating and, more importantly, a lifetime of service to make sure the Pacific voice is heard at the climate summits. Greetings from the Pacific, but I'm in Dubai, COP 28. Thank you, Joshua, and I'm so glad that we are able to connect. And this connection that we have is to connect with the world and humanity and what is an existential threat to the global community, the climate crisis. It is a global problem that demands a global solution. Let's get on to the questions that you may have and how we may be able to explain to our audience who are listening around the world and in the Pacific region, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean, in particular the small island developing states, which we would like them to be the big ocean states because of their huge EEZ. Really good point for looking at their economic zones as you're describing. What's also important though when people talk about human rights is I really think it's important the way the Pacific sees them and also your perspective of what you think is so valuable. Human rights really do boil down to the right to clean air, the right to water, and the right to food. Can you expand on that? Yes, climate change is basically impacting on our daily lives and in order to explain it to let's say children and kids around the world, it is about the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat. Climate change has no borders because it impacts across. So if it impacts the air you breathe, the pollution that the carbon dioxide and the trucks and the fossil fuel is polluting the air, then you'll be breathing polluted air. If the water is polluted, you are drinking polluted water. And if the food is also polluted, then the farm products, the sea where you get your fish, and across the sea and the land, food, water, and air are impacted upon. And that is as simple as you can put it. On the global scale we are looking at how the impacts of climate change in terms of the sea shores and the land, the erosion and all of that. So it is really the daily lives of people that is impacted upon. And as water is the human right or food is human right, and the air we breathe in is human right, then that's an impact. I will get on to the migration and how the threat, the climate crisis affects nations that had to move because of the sea level rise and all of that. That's basically what it is to assure in terms of how it impacts on our daily lives. And the small island states are more impacted upon because they are small and ecologically vulnerable. That's a great point. And it's also the universal declaration of human rights does guarantee people around the world a framework available to assist with all existential crisis is facing humanity. And the UDHR was drafted and adopted in 1940 in Paris and it did rise out of the ashes of the Holocaust but it's still applicable with new emerging challenges that you were sharing. But it goes back to those core aspects of right to clean air, right to food, and of course water as we need all those to basically survive. So that sustainable environment is crucial and the ability for us to participate in politics to guarantee those rights is really at the core of the COP. Correct. So the COP process is a government process and because it's a government process it takes time to negotiate agreement on adaptation, mitigation and financing and collaboration, research and all of that. So the conference of the party process is 10 or more years behind reality. And also the COP process is a government consensus process and therefore it is slow and arduous. So we are now in COP 28 and we're still talking about the same issues about adaptation, mitigation, collaboration and financing. And I think in COP 28 taking the stock take, you have the Paris agreement, you have the Glasgow pact and we now last year we had the loss and damage in agreed to set up a fund for loss and damage for small island developing states which we want to transform to the big ocean states because of their EEZs and their large oceans. So they are not victims of the crisis but they are the big ocean states with the fishery resources and other marine resources that exist there. So EEZs of the big ocean states are critical and we want to save the oceans to save humanity or save humanity by saving the health of the oceans because the health of the oceans, the five oceans of the world, 71% of the earth surface is oceans, water, lakes, watersheds and rivers and lakes. All of that contribute to the water resources that the world needs to the health of the oceans is critical for the health of humanity. And the Pacific Ocean as the ocean of peace, we want the five oceans as oceans for peace inclusive of the five oceans. Saving those five oceans is to save the health of humanity. Oh that's a really good point and what is so crucial I believe about your perspective is you were at COP 1, the first COP ever in Berlin. Can you describe what COP 1 was like and looking at it now for COP 28? Yeah COP 1, it was an emotional impact on the small island developing states in Berlin in 1995. What we were asking for was the the AOCs, Alliance for Small Island States, would like to have a 20% reduction to the 1990 levels. That was the cry in COP 1 that we requested the next one parties, those that pollute the started the pollution of the the earth should reduce the emissions by 20%. So that was a big big ask to have an next one parties to reduce the emissions to the 1990 levels by 20%. As well the Alliance for Small Island States had the emotional impact to say that because we are frontline states that we will be mostly affected, most affected, although we contribute less to the pollution of the world. We are the first ones to be impacted upon and therefore we regard ourselves the analogy we used 27 years ago, 28 years ago was that small island developing states are canneries in a coal mine and that is the image that we had then. So over the last 27 years now 28 years later we are still discussing the issues that have been on the agenda for a long time and the main issue now is financing and the global community needs to work together with the different sectors, the private sector, civil society and the governments need to work together to have the enabling environment to raise the funds to mitigate, adapt and collaborate in order to address the key issues that we are facing in terms of human rights of all people in the world, in particular the indigenous rights people in indigenous communities who are custodians of their own resources you know have been impacted upon and the small island states the water the water say in Kiribati they had to use the same water that they wash their dishes they recycle that to also have a shower and then wash dishes and then dispose the water into the garden for the plants and the crops that they want to grow. So a six buckets of water can be used by a family of say 10 to 15 and they had to fetch the water and at the same time try and use the same amount of water to do the dishes and base with that as well as putting the water at the end into the plants and the gardens around their houses. So that's how important water is and which is part of human rights. No it's a really good point and as you're at COP 1 and now you see COP 28 supposedly it's the highest number of people here maybe you could share a bit about what you see around this COP 28 in Dubai and going forward as humanity. Yeah in COP 28 the big difference now is that you have more people participating in the COP process uh for example today I was at the the main plenary where you have the indigenous people talking and you have women and young people gathering together in the hall so at least you would have something like you know a couple of thousand people that are in this big hall and they were able to express themselves through a structured way but people listening and yelling and agreeing to the speakers and the advocates the campaigners all in the room trying to have their voices heard and I think there are more voices today than there were in the previous COP so COP 28 really marks a huge number of young people getting involved the youth are getting involved the women the indigenous people the people whose rights have been denied in the previous years so now their voices are being heard and I think that is the biggest difference I see between COP 1 and COP 28 the largest number attending this COP 28 is in the in thousands I I heard the number from 75 to 79,000 people gathered in Dubai COP 28 and it's true it's there's so many aspects as you said there's the when you first walk in there's those two giant buildings the B1 with halls that sit thousands of people and then if you keep walking you then see up to B7 and each beam seven is just an area and then there's buildings all these buildings of 89 86 there's pavilions then on those pavilions there's booths and you were yesterday speaking on and Monash what were some of the topics that you were looking at at the Monash University booth and what were some of the discussions that were pertinent to the people of the Pacific and all those caring about our beautiful planet. Yes there's a whole series there from youth gatherings and in one of the I think on day eight on the 8th of December the youth were there in numbers I think there were at least three or four groups of youth coming in to express their place in the stage so Monash hosted the youth as well as Monash hosted yesterday was the oceans the Pacific island nations were there with the Caribbean nations to try and articulate the the need to to protect the oceans because they depend on it and also to address the question of small island developing states to become the huge big ocean states because of their EEZ and taking care of the five oceans and their health is taking care of the health of humanity as well as the health of the Pacific depends on the Pacific Ocean itself and protection and management of the resources in the in the ocean like tuna because the Pacific houses at least 60 percent of the tuna resources in the world so Monash has a big delegation and they have they had a pavilion Monash pavilion in the blue zone that has been managed by a group of the program designers for Monash hosting so many panels of discussion from sustainable development climate change reduction of poverty and having you young people youth to have their voices heard and the the the whole range of participants as well as organizers of the of the the Monash pavilion we have associated professor Susie Ho professor Sally about about and we have a whole team there dog we had the Dr. Benjamin Thompson who was also quite key in the organization and the whole team of Monash the professors and associated professors and doctors and the whole team there so I was pleased that the Monash is a picture there and we have a high side professor Paris Narayan who spoke and delivered a team from Fiji in climate accounting and that is critical a new area that has come up now in the the stage climate accounting and this is a unique feature of the the the island nations moving forward to professor Paris Narayan with a team from Fiji coming to to explain what climate accounting is and what the potential is there is so it's a whole host of things so I think COP 28 has more to say about the world but we we still need to do more particular I'm quite concerned about the financing area Joshua and we need to work on that no there's definitely a lot and as you look from COP 1 to COP 27 last year in Charmel shake and then this year being there it really does combine a whole field of human rights offenders you have academics you have attorneys you have activists and even artists all trying to make sure that the voice of the earth gets out and as you're describing it it reminds me of Malama Honua in Hawaii to take care of each other but also take care of our island earth because we understand what's like to live in a fragile ecosystem can you share a bit and what you were describing of when we look at what people are facing with the climate crisis in a way it's intangible it's you know you did say and it is true we have to look at funds but the other side is certain things are beyond what the current economic system can absorb and you are getting to something deeper when we look at how indigenous and pacific island peoples are impacted with the climate crisis let's take Tuvalu which is the lowest lying apple country in the Pacific so if Tuvalu suffers from sea level rise the first thing they will have to do is if you relocate the the people of Tuvalu that's fine but then they will leave behind they heritage the culture their identity and that in loss and damage that is not considered as an asset because you cannot account for it there is is is non tangible they can only count for the tangible things you know their houses their buildings the material wealth they have but then the the human none their consciousness their being their identity that's what they the loss that cannot be ascertained because it's it's non tangible and that is that is key to relocation of communities throughout the Pacific now the biggest health that has come from the region is you have organizations the prop agencies such as spread SPC PIFS Pacific Island Forum and the USP those crop agencies the FFA forum agency the the crop agencies in the region are doing their best and they are they they do the capacity building they ensure to build resilience in the countries and they support the countries to to adapt and build resilience and also bring in money from other donors to support the ODA that the countries get from donors and then on top of the ODA is the risk the additional financing which is climate change and I think that's what is being done today and one of the problems with that is that the donors need to be educated about financing the block grants to support the the cost of climate change as well as the ODA cost rather than working in silos and finance a little bit there in climate change minus a little bit there in terms of development they need to be educated to have to treat climate change and development integrated and therefore this is where Monas has come in to help in the interdisciplinary nature of climate change and development so you have the faculty of architecture the faculty of sustainable development and you have engineer engineers working together with the social scientists and that and the medical doctors working hand in hand with the other faculties to address the the health in the for example there is a project in Fiji that's a good example called RISE which is revitalization of informal settlements and other environments this is a classic interdisciplinary work between the faculty of architecture engineering and engineers and carpenters and medical professionals working together with FNU Fiji National University and the the the local people in Fiji to try and enhance that interdisciplinary work the biomimicry kind of nature based solution and that is quite a good example of what universities can do interaction with the people now that's a really good point you also point out and illustrate how many more aspects are included in a way you're shattering the silos from early on in the cops and drawing all the connections and with those connections showing the consequences and so when we look at article 13 it does provide the path for people of the pacific living on the front lines of climate change to be able to be included in article 13 recognizes everyone on earth has right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state thus recognizing each state also has a right to exist so it's that self-determination that all people have the right to exist and are able to be part of the global family or ohana as we call it maybe you can share with us the other aspect that everyone has the right to leave that country but also be able to return to one's ancestral homeland noting then that the land must be there forever for people to be able to have these rights yes that's a very important point Joshua the the first thing you want to do is if we act now rather than waiting we may be able to save these apple countries so they don't have to leave their homeland and therefore the human rights aspect is quite a critical one and this is has to do with the the respect for human rights and to be compliant and and respect human rights everyone has the right to live and that is the reason why the the small island states have a right they are ecologically vulnerable but they are not victims of this crisis they do not contribute to the crisis in the in a large way as the the biggest states and the annex one parties but one thing is in good will and good faith the small island developing states are working together with the global community and the the regional communities to ensure that they also contribute towards adaptation mitigation and financing as well as building resilience and I think building resilience is fundamental you can adapt but if you if you don't build resilience that the adaptation can get a shock and you have a lot more problem than being resilient so the resilience is like an athlete building his or her stamina to run a distance race and and therefore you are prepared to withstand shocks or stress and that the stamina and building resilience is also the same with a nation or people working to ensure that the level of resilience is built through capacity building and working on both the health and the the physical health of the people and the nation which is part of the human rights and respect for it that the respectful the water they drink the air they breathe and the food they they grow and eat so the interrelatedness of the different sectors of society and therefore you know the whole question of labor force and how labor and the unions need to be respected for what they represent because their jobs that depend on the employment that they have and the decency of work and those are elements of human rights decent work and employment and job job creation is quite critical and therefore labor unions transport the whole area of transportation is critical and we need to look at whether transportation on land or at sea or air we need to reduce emissions and have renewable energy and turn to renewables in order to reduce the use of fossil fuel and we can transition from fossil fuel to circular carbon economy where we depend on renewables and clean energy those are really good points as we look forward and it is important as you can describe all those different aspects of these rights can you provide a vision for the future of this important right for migration with Tuvalu in Australia having a recent agreement and other aspects where the people are guaranteed that they'd have a place to live even fees you where land was purchased to make sure that people can have that land that identity as you were saying in that place-based perspective of what matters most of that collective fully on our responsibility for one another. Yes I think the bigger nations like Fiji the Australia and countries like Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands they also be considered and for the relocation of the smaller countries such as Tuvalu and Marshall Islands and Kiribati already the Solomon Islands has relocated Kiribati people back you know 50-60 years ago we have now a Kiribati community on Wagena in the Solomon Islands so that is one of the first relocations but Kiribati and Tuvalu need to be we have to be prepared to look after our brothers and sisters if something happens but we hope that they don't have to move but it is important that we look at the question of migration relocation Tuvalu now is looking at different ways of adapting they even want to turn Tuvalu into a digitized kind of nation where they have their data collected and their identity is being put into a computer data system so if something happened at least that they have a storage of their history and all of that so they are thinking ahead but we hope nothing drastic will happen and therefore we need to take action now rather than later to save the fiscal islands and Tuvalu is planning at looking at raising the land so that and that will cost quite a bit of money but you know it might be worth it to look at the cost factor of raising Tuvalu to higher ground so that to avoid sea level rise great point Rex and that really does bring us to where we're at that understanding human rights to make sure we're looking at human rights for all we're looking at the issue of migration but it's that holistic human rights those inherent rights that we all have from self-determination but also that right of solidarity we all share to stand up and we're in the final 24 hours of the negotiations people say it's 1.5 to stay alive and based on your perspective of climate change we appreciate you joining us and thank you so much for all you do regarding oceans for peace