 Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening to all of you to this first session of IOM's International Dialogue on Migration 2021, accelerating integrated action and sustainable development, migration, the environment and climate change. I would like to ask our colleague to give some technical advice and then we will proceed. The floor is yours. Thank you. I want to thank everyone for being here and make some key announcements. Interpretation for this event is available in English, French and Spanish. Please select your preferred language using the interpretation button at the bottom of your screen. There are English closed captions for increased accessibility. To enable, click the closed caption button and choose show subtitle. If you encounter any issues with the platform, we are providing a backup live stream on the URL shown on your screen. I will also share the link to that in the chat shortly. 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I will now hand the floor back to Director General of IOM, Mr. Antonio Vitrino for opening remarks. Thank you so much. And once again, welcome to this first session of our 2021 IDM. It's for me a pleasure to welcome you all now when we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the International Dialogue on Migration. They provided, I believe, a platform to highlight and to debate the key migration governance issues of our times. This year, we have decided to dedicate this event to a topic that is not just a concern for the future, but for all of us today, the impacts of climate and environmental change on migration. In 2001, IDM celebrated the 50th anniversary of the organization, looking back at the evolution of IOM's work since 1951 in the service of governments and migrants. Twenty years later, as we recognize a more mature but not yet old IOM at 70, the world is recovering from a major shock, a global pandemic that has put a halt to traditional internal and international mobility patterns. But while we are all preoccupied with response and recovery to COVID-19, a task that I fear will take many years, we must not be distracted. Over the past several decades, climate change and environmental degradation has emerged as what I could say the defining issue of our time. Slowly, the impacts of this change on migration and mobility has moved into the spotlight, due in no small part to the efforts of IOM colleagues who have been constantly promoting awareness, advocacy and action. Indeed, 10 years ago, IOM organized the first IDM on migration, environment and climate change, aiming first and foremost to encourage parallel nascent climate negotiations to integrate migration and displacement issues. A decade later, we are proud to see migration and displacement issues fully integrated in the Paris Agreement, the dress through many other relevant international processes and dialogues. Our awareness and knowledge of the challenge have expanded tremendously, just as the impacts for migrants, displaced populations and broader communities have proliferated. Yet so much is still to be done. Our objective today is to call on the governments, partners and experts gathered here today to accelerate action on migration, environment and climate change through strong partnerships and innovative initiatives. Climate change and its adverse impacts increasingly affect how, when and where people migrate worldwide. There is no region in the world, no region in the world that has avoided population movements directly or indirectly linked to adverse climate impacts. We are seeing increasing levels of rural to urban migration in African cities, population relocation away from rising sea levels in small island states. The next step in migration is complex and expertise from many different policy areas is definitely needed to inform the development of concrete responses. More than ever, multilateralism is needed to address the changing nature of our world. States cannot tackle migration issues and adverse climate change impacts alone. We therefore must redouble our commitment to collective action towards the effective implementation of relevant global frameworks and enhanced policy co-events. This includes ensuring the robust implementation of the global compact for migration, the Paris Agreement, the UNFCCC recommendations on addressing displacement related to the adverse impacts of climate change, the Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction and the Nansen initiative protection agenda. More international cooperation is needed to create genuinely transformative changes and support the state's most vulnerable to climate impacts. The global compact on migration provides us with a reference framework to address the migration and climate change nexus and create synergies with the commitments made under the Paris Agreement. Jointly delivering on both these commitments will also leverage our contribution to 2030 agenda goals. For this reason, the UN migration network on migration has decided to address this topic as a thematic priority for 2021 and 2022. The migration and climate change work stream led by the UNFCCC secretariat and by IOM, with the support of other network members, is currently developing a robust work program. And as coordinator of the network, I am committed to supporting the network's efforts to support member states who request our technical expertise. As the director general of IOM, I consider the migration and climate change nexus to be our key institutional priority. We have developed a new institution-wide strategy on migration, environment and climate change that has benefited from broad consultations and engagement with many of you and which will be presented in the coming month. We have identified key priority areas where we consider action to be urgently needed and where IOM can add value and provide effective support to member states, to migrants and to the other communities. Looking ahead, we have identified specific gaps and challenges, such as the interplay between climate change, migration and urban planning, or the links between climate, migration and conflict. Our vision and commitment are to promote a comprehensive approach to migration environment and climate change, grounded in human rights-based approaches and for the benefit of migrants and societies. When well managed, migration becomes a safe and accessible choice. It can help people adapt to environmental and climate change pressures. Over the next three days, we will take stock of advances, gaps and challenges across multiple dimensions of the climate and migration nexus. My hope is that at the end of this dialogue, in line with the purposes of the IDM, we will have identified practices, lessons learned and recommendations that will support the development and implementation of concrete actions for the benefit of those states and migrants. The results of our common work will feed into our contributions to the upcoming COP26, a vitally important milestone. Colleagues, excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, I look forward to fruitful deliberations and I am convinced that together we can rise to the challenge. Thank you. And to follow up with this opening session, I would like now to present the video of Mr Josiah Vareque Bainin Marama, retired Honorable Prime Minister and Admiral of Fiji. I have the great pleasure to present the remarks of Mr Bainara Marama and I would emphasize that he is one of the leading voices calling on the international community to commit to more ambitious targets, to curb carbon emissions and serve as the President of the 23rd Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Please play the video. Mr Antonio Vittorino, Director General of the International Organization for Migration. Mr Volkan Boskar, President of the 75th session of the General Assembly. Ms Amina J. Mohamed, the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations. Ms Runa Khan, the Founder and Executive Director of Friendship. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank the International Dialogue on Migration for taking on the issue of the undeniable interrelationship between migration, the environment and climate change. Climate change displacement has gone from a doomsday proposition to a daily problem for vulnerable nations at a pace at which the current efforts at the adaptation have not matched. We are now face to face with the fact that climate change is forcing people to move and we can expect that trend to accelerate. Some movement may be orderly and planned, but some mass movement of people, particularly cross-border movement, will certainly cause political tension and even violence. The idea is the logical stepping stone to mainstream migration and climate questions in COVID-19 recovery efforts and climate action and identify the specific challenges faced by countries most vulnerable to climate change and most likely to lose or gain population through climate-induced migration. Clearly, while all of us will face the effects of climate induced migration, not all countries will have the same experience. There is no doubt that climate change is an existential threat to our way of life in the Pacific. This threat comes from the rise in sea level, an increasing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events and change to our agriculture and marine fish stocks. Fiji has borne the brunt of two of the strongest tropical cyclones in the southern hemisphere over the past decade. Tropical cyclone Winston and tropical cyclone Yassau. We see no respite in the future from intense and even unpredictable weather patterns. In fact, they appear to be getting worse each year. Some of our neighbors in the Pacific, especially those on low-lying atolls, face the hard reality that they may lose everything. Their homelands may simply disappear. The science is telling us that at the current rate of warming, the Pacific should brace for a way of external cross-border migration as nations sleep beneath the rising sea. If that happens, people will have to find a new place to live. Fiji has offered permanent settlement to the citizens of Tuvalu and Kiribati should it be needed and that offer still stands. Fiji has been given a glimpse of how the changing climate is driving displacement. Within our own borders, we are an expanding and invaluable body of knowledge that we hope can serve the world as cross-border flows of migration intensity. In Fiji, six communities have been fully or partially relocated with the support of the government. More than 40 others have been identified for relocation and we are moving forward methodically, consulting intensely with the people who are affected. This requires considerable resources but the full account is more than dollars in cents. The movement to higher ground often comes at a cost that cannot be calculated. For Fiji's most vulnerable coastal communities, the sea has been a source of livelihoods, prosperity and identity for generations. It is a brutal twist of fate for that same sea that they depend on to now threaten their security. To ensure relocations are managed sustainably, we are looking at ways that communities can generate new forms of income to support themselves and that requires finding answers to hard questions, like how can lifelong fishermen be inspired and empowered to take up farming. We are developing standard operating procedures for planned relocation and a vulnerability assessment framework to guide this all-encompassing process. The lessons learned through every relocation make successive efforts more manageable. This important work cannot wait, which makes the economic devastation caused by COVID-19 all the more bitter. With the shutdown of international borders, Fiji's tourism industry, which drives nearly 40% of our GDP, has come to our standstill. Fiji cannot afford to suffer the continuous economic setbacks brought about by COVID-19 in addition to the costs we bear because of climate change. A joint regional response to both climate change and COVID-19 is needed. Recovery efforts should contribute to the transition to a green economy and build climate resilience, create green jobs and support effective climate action and efforts to reach carbon neutrality. The Paris Agreement, which Fiji was the first country to ratify five years ago, recognized the issue of climate displacement. As president of COP23, Fiji put forward a vision to build greater resilience for all vulnerable nations to the impacts of climate change, including extreme weather events and rising sea levels. In the COP23 decisions, the Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage was tasked with incorporating the impact of climate change into relevant policy, planning and action. This meant, taking into account the ways climate change could be expected to drive migration, displacement and planned relocation. At COP24, Fiji launched the world's first planned relocation guidelines and at COP25, Fiji launched its own displacement guidelines. In 2019, Fiji launched a relocation fund for people displaced by climate change. We have unrelentingly stressed the point that climate change and displacement threaten basic human rights, including access to food, to water and to a clean and healthy environment, both as the current chair of the platform on disaster displacement and through our active engagement in other global discussions. On this basis, Fiji has advocated inclusive rights-based and transparent processes to address disaster displacement once it occurs, but we have also stressed the need to prevent displacement and to address its root causes. The Pacific Island states have also acted as a region through the Boat Declaration, which reaffirms climate change as a security threat and endorses the recommendations included framework for resilient development, the FRDP. We in the Pacific need to explore opportunities for a regional approach to dealing with climate and disaster-related migration. We need to safeguard the rights of families and communities who may be displaced in the future due to climate change. Ladies and gentlemen, Fiji is proud to have contributed to global policy discussions related to the global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration. At the council meeting since we joined the IOM in 2013, we have consistently raised the protection challenges associated with climate mobility, and I wish to acknowledge the work IOM is doing in Fiji and throughout the Pacific to move forward on this front. We hope that this first IOM session will renew countries' commitments to confront the challenges presented by climate change and specifically to deal seriously with the issue of displacement. Now, Vallejo, thank you. Thank you so much for such a lively vision coming from someone who is in the front line. And now, I have the pleasure to welcome the Excellency Nasser Buritta, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Morocco. Morocco is a frontline player in dealing with environmental impacts, and it is a great pleasure to see you, my friend. You have the floor. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, my friend. Before we move on to the subject, I would like to salute the importance of dialogue, which has been imposed in the course of the last 20 years as an area of discussion open and responsible for the challenges and opportunities of migration. We must also acknowledge that dialogue has the capacity to choose every year a decisive theme of justice, the one that has gathered today around migration, of the environment and climate change. We are a perfect example. It is a subject in which the Kingdom of Morocco is completely located. Under the leadership of His Majesty the King Mohammed VI, the commitment of the Kingdom is set to the intersection of migration, the environment and climate change through an integrated action in favor of human and sustainable development. Our dialogue today is in a context that sees the efforts of the entire world converging towards the COVID-19. We have seen the pandemic eradicate its socio-economic impact, to re-release economies and to immunize societies. We must also emphasize that the pandemic has also impacted the migratory dynamics and the slowdown of 27% international migration rate, and it has also considerably compressed the volume of defense transfers of migrants to their country of origin. But it is especially the socio-economic impact that has been the most disastrous. The pandemic has exacerbated the vulnerability of migrants. I think in particular, but not only of migrant workers in the sectors of activity, especially the services and informal sectors that have particularly been devastated by the pandemic. Nevertheless, the discourse on migration can no longer be limited to economic and refugee migrants. It is another category, growing, of migrants on which all our attention must be paid. These are the climatic migrants. The natural disasters and their climatic recovery are indeed the main trigger of new internal movements in the world. In the mean time, nearly 21 million new migrants every year are twice as many as the migrants linked to the conflict and violence. In 2019, almost 2,000 catastrophes have been triggered, 24 million new internal movements in 140 countries. This is the highest number recorded since 2012. Nothing that the first semester of 2020, the natural disasters, have caused the movement of nearly 10 million people. If the category of migrant climatic retains our attention, it is not only because it is imposed by its number, by its number that could reach 200 to 250 million by 2050, but also because it is distinguished by its complexity. It is difficult to quantify with precision, because it often relies on predictions. It is difficult to qualify conceptually, because it burns the borders between forced and voluntary migration in such a situation. It is a multiple factor issue that embraces the climate change with other economic, social and political factors. It is for most of the internal movements or regional migration, because international migration is often inaccessible for the population, the most vulnerable for climate change. Excellent, ladies and gentlemen, I must stop here, especially on the situation in my continent, Africa. Particularly impacted by climate change, Africa is disproportionately affected by the phenomenon of climate migration and environmental. For example, the region of Sahel remains one of the regions of the world most strongly affected by climate change. It is now the center of one of the crises of migration to the fastest growth in the world, with nearly 1.6 million internal displaced people and 365,000 refugees having fled the violence of more than 640,000 in 2020. The link between climate warming, peace and security in Africa is no longer to be demonstrated. The rise of temperatures has increased the risk of conflicts of 11% of Sub-Saharan Africa since 1980. If this trend continues, this percentage could reach 54% in 2030, listen to life after 400,000 people, especially in the rise of stress, increasing and decreasing agricultural surfaces. I also think of small state-of-the-art developments that are confronted with existential challenges due to climate change. We do not only have the responsibility to act, excellent ladies and gentlemen, but also the duty to do it quickly, to judge the movements linked to climate change and to spread the causes of natural disasters and environmental degradation. The conviction of Morocco is that an urgent action of the international community should be based around the next three complementary acts, protect displaced people, and facilitate preventive movements to remove the danger and prevent massive and abrupt movements. Thirdly, fight against climate change by strengthening adaptation and resilience policies through the Convention of the United Nations on Climate Change and the Bar Courses. These three acts are the extension of Morocco's doctrine, in which Morocco is impregnated in order to fight against the effects of climate change. Thus, in terms of adaptation and attenuation of climate change, Morocco is the leader with an ambitious tendency to reduce emissions of gas to 42% in the 2030 horizon. Even the kingdom has considerably increased the part of renewable energies over the last 10 years, and is likely to reach the objective of 52% of renewable energy capacity in 2030. At the regional level, Morocco, under the leadership of its Majesty the King, has developed a strong climate solidarity with the countries of Africa. I would like to refer in particular to the organization of the first African summit of the action in favor of the continental emergency co-emergence, the Initiative triple A, adaptation of African agriculture, the Initiative 3S, launched jointly with Morocco and Senegal, which offers innovative solutions through alternatives to forced migration, and finally the coalition on sustainable energy, as well as the African youth climate hub platform. Excellent ladies and gentlemen, the engagement of Morocco in terms of fighting climate change, and thus the pendant of its engagement on the migration issue. I mean, of course, the national migration policy launched by His Majesty the King, Mohamed VI, is based on solid and human values. The African agenda on migration presented by His Majesty the King in 2018 as the leader of Africa on the migration issue, and the international conference of Marrakech in 2018, which saw the adoption of the World Pact on migration. For this realization, Morocco, which is pleased to be part of the countries championing the implementation of the Marrakech Pact, proposes to keep in mind this year a ministerial meeting of the champion countries. With the coronation of a joint declaration, it would aim to promote this pact and the sensitization for the implementation of these goals. Excellent ladies and gentlemen, I would like to, before concluding, to say that the protection of the environment, the struggle against climate change and the management of migration, is one of the rituals that share the same common denominator. These structural challenges are all made up of the awareness of collective challenges. Then, a political will and sincere commitment of all the actors. Finally, a management based on the fundamental principles of shared responsibility and mutual respect. Nevertheless, the whole of these precepts would not be effective. Without some elementary principles. And I want to say here the position that is that of transit countries, which are also often both of the countries of migration and immigration. The first of these principles is that the management of the borders cannot make the object of an externalization. We have said it repeatedly. The transit countries do not have the responsibility to be gender, nor the vocation to be border guards. The second principle that we take off is that the responsibility in migration would not be to make the object of transfer. Transferring its responsibility is not only to defoss it, but also to empty the logic of the partnership from its substance. A partner is an associated, equal, and is neither a good chemist, nor an opponent. The third principle is that migrants should not make the object of an instrumentalization. Emotional chanting, the binary conceptions, do not serve migrants. To serve migrants is precisely the opposite. It is refused to comply with the cynicism of migratory policies that are summarized in the strengthening of the borders and the increase in deportation of the rest, often in the summer. It is for migratory policies, including with the partnership with Morocco, which is called by its own. Here we are, what I want to tell you, Mr. General Director, dear ladies and gentlemen, this is especially why when Morocco expresses itself on migration, they are also at ease that it is consistent. I thank you for your attention. Thank you, Mr. Minister, for your testimony, not only of Morocco's commitment, but also the panoramic of the entire African continent. Now we proceed to listen to the message that was sent to us by the President of the 75th session of the General Assembly, is Excellency Mr. Volkan Roskiv that has put the climate agenda on top of his chairmanship of the General Assembly. Let's see his message. Thank you. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, I'm honored to join you in opening the 2021 International Dialogue on Migration. This year's dialogue is of particular significance. The world continues to grapple with both the health and socio-economic impacts of COVID-19, and there remains the ever-increasing threat of climate change. I commend IOM and the UN Network on Migration for offering this opportunity to advance cooperation and coordination at this time of great need. Colleagues, allow me to be frank. As our attention was focused nearly exclusively on the global pandemic and its impact on our own citizens, it was the most vulnerable, including migrants who paid the price. It was those already furthest behind who have had to wait for health and prevention support, who were denied job and economic relief, and who still do not know when they will have access to vaccines. It is our responsibility to leave no one behind and to protect and empower all people, including migrants. As we move on, and begin to construct our world beyond the pandemic, we must pause to reflect on the gaps that have persisted, and to ensure that future crises do not see the very same mistakes take place. Now is your opportunity to do just that. With recovery from COVID-19 rolling out globally at unprecedented levels, we must ensure that policies and actions support the situation faced by migrants. This can be achieved through projects and intended to spur economic growth and create jobs, as well as funding allocated to boost health care and other social programs. Achieving this, however, requires a deliberate effort to look after those who too often fall through the cracks, who too often do not have the support of social safety nets. Dear colleagues, we must remember that migrants have played an important role throughout the course of the pandemic. Migrants have stood on the front lines, providing health support. Migrants have worked in the food and service industries, helping to keep our societies and our economies afloat. And migrants, as scientists, have helped lead efforts to successfully develop a global vaccine. Yet, despite this, migrants have been disproportionately affected. As President of the UN General Assembly, I am pleased to say that recovery from COVID-19 vaccines for all, and the advancement of the humanitarian agenda, with a focus on the most vulnerable, have been amongst my priorities for the 75th session. And we have continued to champion these interconnected issues at every turn. I appreciate the opportunity to address you today. And I commend you for your support for this important topic. In closing, allow me to reiterate that we must heed the lessons learned during this period. While the pandemic has dominated our agenda, the larger climate crisis continues to loom. Unchecked climate change will have profound implications on migration, threatening the relocation of entire regions, especially in countries in special situations, such as least developed countries, landlocked developing countries, and small island developing states. Recovery from COVID-19 must therefore embrace green policies that both mitigate climate change, but also strengthen adaptive capacity. With COP26 on the horizon, as well as COP-level events around biodiversity and desertification, land degradation, and drought, there are ample opportunities to push forward on these items. Dear colleagues, the resources and policy options available now are of incredible proportions and maybe our single best chance this decade to truly and meaningfully make change. Let us not squander it. Thank you. Thank you so much. I want to thank the president of the 75th session of the General Assembly for the very straightforward message that he has just delivered us. And now it's my privilege and honor to introduce the message that has been sent to IDM by Ms. Amina Mohamed, the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations. Please, can you put the video of Amina Mohamed? Excellencies Distinguished Elegates, it is my pleasure to join IOM's flagship international dialogue on migration. This dialogue comes during a vital year for protecting nature and people. Too many people around the world are forced to move by climate emergencies. In the first half of 2020, disasters displaced 9.8 million people and were the leading trigger of new internal displacements. We know that these numbers will grow as climate change worsens. Women and girls are disproportionately affected and women make up 60 to 80 percent of small holder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa, livelihoods that are highly climate sensitive. But they make up only 15 to 20 percent of landholders, which makes their return following displacement much more difficult. Moreover, when women and girls are displaced, they face much greater risk of gender-based violence. We have also seen migrants disproportionately affected by the pandemic through border restrictions, high rates of unemployment and inconsistent access to national health systems. Excellencies, the question for this dialogue, therefore, is how can we best prevent the displacement and migration that is caused by climate change and better support migrants and host communities where prevention falls short. Allow me to highlight four areas for your consideration. The first, the best way to prevent climate-related migration and displacement is to limit warming to 1.5 degrees. All countries need to step up with credible, enhanced, nationally determined contributions ahead of COP26 and with long-term strategies to put the world on a trajectory to net zero emissions by mid-century. Second, we must have a breakthrough in adaptation and resilience, driven by allocating 50 percent of climate finance. We need to ensure that countries follow through on their commitment to provide $100 billion in climate finance and ensure that access to these resources is eased, particularly for the most vulnerable. Securing the necessary financing for adaptation and resilience is a requirement for preventing displacement. Third, we need to prioritize support to those countries and communities that are directly affected and most vulnerable to climate change and displacement, particularly the least developed countries and small island developing states. Expanded early warning systems, access to insurance for crop loss, and improvements to protective infrastructure depend on these resources. In Bangladesh, forecast-based financing reduced household asset losses from flooding by 27 percent and helped many people stay in place. In India, systemic improvements to early warning and evacuation have prevented nearly all loss of life from cyclones and significantly shortened displacement. But we will be unable to stop climate-related displacement and migration. Indeed, it will only grow as the world continues to warm, impacts become more frequent and severe, and some countries face extreme territorial loss. This means we need to support displaced populations, as well as the communities and countries that will host them. To do this effectively, we must ensure that policy responses and financial decision-making include vulnerable countries, communities, and migrants and displaced populations who know their own challenges and have their own solutions. Fourth, we need to understand that climate change is combining with inequality, conflict and the impacts of the pandemic to drive greater deprivation and forced migration. We need a whole-of-society approach, rooted in delivering the Sustainable Development Goals over the course of the decade of action to help people maintain their livelihoods, health, rights, and access to basic services. Across the months ahead at the High-Level Political Forum, the major conferences on food systems, energy, biodiversity, and climate change, we need to secure a more stable, resilient future for populations most at risk. Next year's International Migration Review Forum will then have a strong basis for reducing displacement and ensuring the necessary support for migrants and host communities. In each of these areas, you can count on the support of the UN system. Through the UN Migration Network, we have a platform for leveraging the knowledge and expertise of UN entities in an integrated manner as governments work to implement the global compact for safe, orderly, and regular migration. I wish you every success in your important deliberations. Thank you. Thank you so much, Deputy Secretary General. We are very reassured by the fact that the climate change and the link with migration figures top of the agenda of the UN system as a whole. And above all, for your recommendation to look at this issue from an all-of-society perspective. And that's precisely it is my pleasure now to introduce you to Mr. Runa Khan, founder and executive director of Friendship, an international social purpose organization established in Bangladesh in 2002 to support remote communities in the country, particularly exposed to adverse impacts of climate change. And Runa, thank you so much for being with us, especially at this very late hour in your country. We appreciate very much. You have the floor. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Antonio Vittorino, very distinguished speakers, guests. Thank you for the invitation to speak at this much needed international dialogue on migration. Forced migration is an overwhelming reality of today, its impact and possible scale, a frightening thought for our coming tomorrow. Ideas, policies, scores of actions are giving momentum, but truth is, nothing is decreasing its volume or dangers or pain of each occurrence. All washed away in front of my eyes, my home, my land. Selenity has taken over, no longer can I group crops or drink the water of my land. I used to have a happy home, wives, children, food and hope. Today I pull a rickshaw, live in the slums, alone with no hope left in me. My child wrenched from my arms was thrown into the fire, all quoted to me as a witness by affected migrants. Migration due to predictable climate issues has been happening historically. But what a difference when unpredictability of unimaginable magnitude happens along with overwhelming increase in demography? For then, no longer does it allow migrants to plan and secure physical space for restarting their life elsewhere. What happens when refugees do not migrate in tents but in millions? We know. Trying to take steps for prevention is no longer acceptable. Actions need to be spoken of as already taken. Climate migrants are a global phenomena. Environmental degradation has led to people being trapped in their vulnerabilities. In 2019-24.9 million new IDPs across 140 countries were linked to sudden onset disasters, conflict, violence to another 8.5 million. Data for slow migration like sea level rise or river erosion triggered displacements are very hard to come by. We don't know. COVID-19 more than ever before people are moving to different places in search of likelihood. The world's biggest challenges are accelerating. Climate crisis and migration, poverty and migration, migration from fear of terrorism, political migrants, pollution of air, water, migration due to demography, lack of space, and now the global health crisis. All defying borders yet raising new and still higher borders and barriers, they are trapped. So going through traditional modalities of negotiation and for about to be made policy, it's already late because at the time it's decided and implemented new challenges are arising. How do you perceive to be able to manage the fact that climate migrants are going to multiply at least three to four times in the coming years and will sooner or later break the borders? Internal displacement unlike inter-country migration is mostly silent and invisible. Bangladesh is a country of 170 million people on 148,000 square kilometers of land with 52 are often underwater, seventh on the global climate risk index. One meter rise is one fifth of the country underwater, thus becoming foremost in number of people to be impacted and friendship over the last 20 years has been working successfully finding adaptation solutions to access basic human needs for migrant communities. Health through floating hospitals and services given by trained community medics prevention easing suffering to curing. Being by their sides, preparing them through our community initiated disaster risk programs, giving access to knowledge and funds through our climate resilience economic actions, training, empowering, micro social entrepreneurs so they can always carry their knowledge, training and crafts, farmers, fishermen, parasolid technicians, paravets, paralegals, paramedics, teachers, weavers and then strengthening them with linkages to the government services and legal help. Ensuring deep understanding of their own work and their own ecosystem every time they move to continue in enabling to give services, earn and restart their lives within their moving communities. Ensuring that they are nurturing dignity and self-respect is for me the single most important factor for enabling this distressed pained community to return to the mainstream. I have a short film to show you, I hope they can show it now. Thank you very much. Nearly one million Runginga have been forced to flee their homes. For 20 years I've been a witness and a problem solving actor in this changing environment. Dealing with IDPs and today with the Rohingyas. Serving more than 6.5 million people annually. Realizing everything is not totally unsolvable. I have received my share of rice, my neighbor still needs it, please give it to them. I have savings with friendship and a school has now shifted to our island. I don't need more. I now know that drinking saline water had caused me three miscarriages but having a clinic at my door and fresh drinking water from the water plants today I have a beautiful healthy day. Hope happens but actions are needed for it to happen. Each migration, each reason for migration, each migrating community in each country has unique issues and problems. It needs to be micro and macro managed. There is no panacea for everyone everywhere. We need to accept this to prevent forced migration is the long-term solution. Yet seeing the daily migrants we know simultaneously people need protection and they need it now. With each migration people fall below the poverty line shifting the economic curve downwards. It has a direct impact on any country which wants to reach the SDG goals. Governments need to identify climate vulnerable migrant communities, treat them as valuable members of their own society country. So often they are ignored ensuring that these policies address directly practically the reality of the migration and is addressed with solidarity, compassion, empathy, policies which are credible, possible and acceptable by the population and communities. If IOM extends their help for doing this in the way acceptable by the governments, helping in providing dialogue for collaboration with policymakers and civil society sharing experiences in finding internal solution, forced migration or at least impact of forced migration may lessen. Safety in migration needs to be ensured so that people for whom this is happening do not see it as a failure, a fear or a tragedy but a tool to restart their life. Preparedness is key but preparedness and foresight for all of our stakeholders involved. Most migratory populations spiral economically downwards due to total lack of needed economic and life skills and lack of strength due to no access to basic services, good health, education, skill training, access to finance, understanding of legal processes and knowledge of where to go to get support which is very often the governments are providing are key to the migrant's ability for restarting their life sometimes twice, three times a year. Minimizing scales of many natural disasters by simply caring and improving management, repairing the embankment leaks on time shelters for seeing giving timely warnings for threatening famine, cyclones, floods along with preparedness. 20-year-old Mollida, a trained friendship flood volunteer from a chore called Chorros in Ireland called Goynar Potul, rescued 45 women and children during the last flood by building a banana raft you know with the stock with the banana stock and today with all the famines, good intentions how is it not possible to address this issue more impactfully. It is not only about assistance but about imbuing people in a way where massive assistance will not be needed helping them to become resilient empowered being able to restart their life with opportunity and hope to have the strength and dignity to make their own decisions. All of us here today for all of us this is a responsibility and acting on this responsibility is our only option. Thank you. Thank you so much Runa very for your very impressive contribution and for the ideas that you have put forward I think that there is a common message from all the participants we need to build back better but we need to look to the impacts of climate change because it is a joint endeavor and definitely this is probably the best introduction for our first panel that we call it the road to COP26. So the question is what can be done what should be done in order to accelerate action to address migration and displacement in the context of climate and environmental change. We know that Glasgow is going to be a milestone and we want to make sure that this part of the issue is visible and is given the necessary attention from the international community and we are very lucky today to have a high quality panel of interventions and speakers that I will immediately present to you and the first one is the foreign minister of Bangladesh Dr. A. K. Abdul Momen we have a video message from him and I would like to ask to put his video message on now. Thank you. Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Mr. Antonio Vittorino director general of IOM excellencies ladies and gentlemen. Assalamu alaikum peace be upon you. I thank the IOM for organizing the session of the international dialogue on migration 2021 to discuss the emerging nexus between migration environment and climate change at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented socioeconomic challenges across the world. Excellencies climate change is a major contributor to environmental degradation affecting global food, energy, health and economic security. Moreover these phenomena directly or indirectly jeopardize the lives and livelihood especially of climate vulnerable communities causing widespread displacement and migration between countries and across borders. According to the report of internal displacement monitoring center 17.2 million people were displaced as a result of climate related disasters in 2018 and 9.3 million of them which is more than half where from the Asia specific region. Distinguished guests, Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change and ranked seven on the 2020 global climate climate risk index. Due to its unique geographic location every year Bangladesh experiences extreme weather events that result in loss of lives lands homes and livelihoods and eventually forced displacement of people across the country causing slums in cities and towns. Sea level rise increasing salinity and river erosion forced people in Bangladesh to become climate migrants inside the country. The 42 million people living in 19 coastal districts of Bangladesh are under severe threat for climate change. One-fifth of Bangladesh could be inundated by one meter rise in the sea level. We are forced to create shelters and housing for our climate migrants although these people are being uprooted from their sweet homes due to global erratic climate changes. Moreover the 1.1 million forcibly displaced Rohingyas from Myanmar had sheltered in the environmentally important Cox's Bazaar district that has caused a significant impact on the ecology of the country. Excellencies despite these constraints Bangladesh has emerged as a global leader in climate change adaptation. Bangladesh is spending nearly five billion US dollar each year for adaptation and mitigation. We have set up nearly fourteen thousand five hundred cyclone shelters. We are the first LDC to set up the climate chain trust fund from our own resources. As of now four hundred fifteen million dollars have been dispersed from the fund to support more than eight hundred adaptation and resilience building related projects. The regional office of the global center on adaptation for South Asia has also been established in Dhaka Bangladesh to promote and disseminate the collective regional efforts for accelerating locally based climate adaptation mechanisms. Bangladesh is the current chair of the Portgate member climate vulnerable forum. Since Bangladesh has taken over the presidency of the CBF it has been raising the issue of displacement of climate vulnerable communities which is a form of laws and damage and different regional and international forums. Bangladesh believes that the international community should commence discussion on the creation of an appropriate framework to address the needs of climate migrants. Ladies and gentlemen we need to remember that there is a limit of adaptive capacities in particular by the vulnerable countries. Mass displacement due to climate change has severe impacts on the vulnerable communities. Moreover climate financing remains severely under resource. In such scenario I would like to flag the following suggestions. First there is no alternative of taking immediate mitigation efforts to reduce emission of greenhouse gases by the major emitters and they must aggressively meet their NDCs. Second Bangladesh is of the view that climate change and related disasters is a development and economic issue and must be addressed in the context of international development cooperation. Third major economies especially G7, G20 and other major economies need to come forward to provide educated resources and technology support to the most vulnerable countries to address the climate change. At least they should come up with USD $100 billion a year as promised at the Paris Agreement. Fourth the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals, the Paris Agreement and the Sundai framework must be implemented in their true spirit. Fifth as we are approaching the COP26 we need to create momentum to accelerate action plan to address migration and displacement in the context of climate change and environmental degradation. Sixth Bangladesh needs to raise and broaden its embankments in the southern districts in order to improve both mitigation and adaptation measures. In addition it must protect and preserve its main group Srundarbong, a global Sarkarbon Singh for the benefit of the world. Therefore it needs additional funds. Finally Bangladesh strongly supports strict adherence to UN global compact for safe orderly and regular migration and as a GCM champion country Bangladesh emphasizes on the importance of international support for climate migrants. I thank you all. Thank you so much minister. I praise very much your testimony for someone who is on the front line and has an extensive experience on mitigation and adaptation to climate change and its impact on human mobility and I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate from my side that we very much look forward to cooperate with the climate vulnerable forum that Bangladesh is cherry. Now I think that we can move ahead and welcome the message that was sent to us by Mrs Anne Marie Trevelyan minister for business energy and clean growth United Kingdom International champion on adaptation and resilience for the COP26 presidency. We look forward to the event at the end of the year in November in Glasgow. So let's hear the message of Anne Marie Trevelyan. Hello everyone. I'm delighted to be speaking to you all today and I'm incredibly grateful to be part of this panel. We all know that this is an absolutely vital year for climate action and today is a chance to discuss some of those key and complex dimensions of migration, climate and environmental change. Today is an opportunity to hear the challenges faced by countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. We know that the impact of COVID-19 has made action more difficult but we now have an opportunity to build back better to support communities to adapt and to develop resilience whilst protecting our climate and our environment. I wear two hats in the UK government as minister for business energy and clean growth and as the UK international champion on adaptation and resilience for the COP26 presidency. With each day I've understood more how urgent the need for action to respond to climate risks really is. Natural disasters caused over $150 billion in losses in 2019 and displaced nearly 25 million people. In 2020 over 50 million people worldwide were affected by floods, droughts and storms and in extreme cases forced to move. According to the World Bank without action there could be 143 million internal migrants permanently displaced by climate change related phenomena by 2050 and existing evidence shows that climate extremes and environmental degradation are other amplifiers of migration drivers. The UK recognises the existential threat felt by some communities and that climate change will increasingly become a significant factor in driving people's decision to move. We must therefore learn from those who are on the front line and who have the most experience of tackling climate change. I also want to emphasise the importance of giving recognition to the essential leadership and efforts of women and girls in adapting to the impacts of climate change and climate shocks. They are disproportionately affected by the consequences of climate related displacement and we must therefore listen to these voices and ensure their needs are reflected in our discussions. Donors need to do more to support the adaptation agenda and to scale action which averts, minimises and addresses loss and damage. We urgently need to better understand the complex links between migration, climate change and environmental degradation to inform our policy and action. The UK has commissioned an assessment of existing evidence of how climate change and climate shocks impact migration to support this dialogue especially as we head towards COP26. The UK is also supporting countries with adaptation and resilience planning through major international climate funds like the Green Climate Fund and Programme Funding. We are fulfilling our pledge to attain the goals of the Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction through our contributions to the risk informed early action partnership. Through this the UK is leading the way in scaling up early warning systems to make 1 billion people safer from disaster by 2025. We have also supported the efforts for the establishment of a high level panel on internal displacement which will look at climate change as a compounding factor contributing to internal displacement. The high level panel was submitted to report the UN Secretary General in September of this year with recommendations on how to resolve and prevent further displacement including through adaptation. We believe a successful COP26 will complement international processes around the movement of people and in particular the aims of the global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration GCM. The UK continues to actively work towards implementation of the GCM as has committed £3 million to the UN Migration Trust Fund. We also look forward to participating in an international migration review forum next year. The GCM provides support to our more focused work on climate change and environmental degradation and the UK will continue to put the needs of climate vulnerable countries front and centre in international discussions carrying the priorities we heard clearly at the Climate and Development Ministerial through to the G7, COP26 and beyond. One of our specific priorities for COP26 will be to increase action on adaptation and to avert, minimise and address loss and damage. We will use our presidency to encourage greater commitment to and support for practical action helping those communities most at risk to deal with the impacts of climate change and climate shocks affecting them now. Thank you. Thank you so much Minister and definitely from our side we very much look forward to COP26 debates and we rejoice with the fact that you made yourself the link between the debate in Glasgow in November this year and the role of the International Migration Review Forum in May next year where we will have the opportunity to take stock of the implementation of the global compact on safe orderly and regular migration that has one of the objectives and a number of actions for seeing and to tackle with the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation in human mobility. And now I turn to His Excellency Frank Tresler Zamorano the Ambassador Permanent Representative of Chile to the United Nations and International Organisations here in Geneva. We have worked together with the ambassador and with your country during your presidency of COP25. We know that Chile has been extremely active in dealing with the impacts of climate change in all southern America and we appreciate very much your participation. Ambassador you have the floor. The migrations forced caused by the deterioration of the environmental of its ecosystems are a growing reality and some bidirectional senses, since an insufficient management of these migratory flows produces at the same time damage in the environment, causing effects on health and the living conditions of people. COP25 promotes the action of the states to counteract the effects of climate change in the present, as well as to avoid its consequences in the future, considering the dangerous threats to our economic and social development as food security and access to water among all. The COVID-19 pandemic that has unleashed a global crisis unprecedented and according to the WHO, global warming is a key factor in the appearance of SARS-CoV-2. This is because deforestation, the intensive agricultural practices and the commercialisation of wild animals without protection from their transfer, among other factors, has contributed to the emergence of new zoonotic diseases and to accelerate their spread. At the same time, the correlation that exists between climate change, natural disasters and human mobility requires the adoption of plans and strategies designed under the perspective of exhaustive management of migration, which promotes the OIM. The COVID-19 pandemic imposes for these effects an extremely complex scenario, which is necessary to address all in a solidarity and cooperative way. The Minister of the Environment, Carolina Schmidt from Chile, said that the pandemic could have stopped the world, but not the agenda in the environment. During the present year and last year, Chile has been internationally recognized for its sustainability. Despite the complex current situation, Chile has been forced to implement its own seat during the current president of the COP by including some new topics that are relevant for climate change. Among them, there is the relationship between oceans and climate change, the role of Antarctica as a global climate regulator, the necessary link between science and politics. Finally, the role of the management of hydropower resources at a global level as a transversal element to all climate action. Chile, in the framework of the implementation of the UN framework on climate change, has promoted a multilateral foreign policy based on the protection of the care of the oceans. This line of action has been supported in an active presence at our Ocean conferences and in the leadership in the declarations because of ocean realizadas en la COP 21 y COP 22, que han conducido una intensa agenda a reuniones y eventos en colaboración con otros países, entidades no gubernamentales y académicas. Cerca de un 25% de todos los gases de efecto invernadero son absorbidos por los océanos, lo que produce fenómenos de acidificación y pérdida a la biodiversidad. Asimismo, debido al derretimiento de los hielos, se está produciendo además un aumento del nivel del mar que afecta al borde costero continental y amenaza la existencia de los pequeños estados insulares. Esto es otro ejemplo concreto que tiene consecuencias en la movilidad humana, tema del cual estamos ahora también hablando y preocupados. Para la COP 25, Chile relegó el tema de océanos y cambio climático como un sello distintivo de este importante evento, trabajando con algunos países en la incorporación de los océanos en la agenda de la COP, particularmente desde el enfoque de la adaptación. En miras a la COP 26, Chile seguirá impulsando una agenda azul, considerando las últimas evidencias científicas disponibles y el trabajo realizado en diferentes plataformas oceánicas. La adaptación al cambio climático ha sido identificada como una prioridad para nuestro país. Nuestra alta vulnerabilidad y el aumento de la frecuencia e intensidad de los eventos climáticos extremos han generado una demanda aún mayor de recursos para realizar grandes inversiones que fortalezcan la capacidad de adaptación a sus efectos que puedan afectar nuestras capacidades de desarrollo. Nuestro país ha puesto en práctica distintos planes e iniciativas destinadas a contrarrestar los efectos del calentamiento global. En febrero del 2020 se estableció la mesa, movilidad humana y cambio climático, la que es coordinada por la Oficina Nacional de Emergencias, acompañada de reparticiones como el Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, Ministerio del Interior y Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, entre otros. Chile se ha sumado también a la incorporación a nivel regional de la temática de movilidad humana, desastres y cambio climático, del año 2010, en la décima reunión de la Conferencia Sudamericana sobre Migraciones y retomada en la quincea reunión de la Conferencia Sudamericana de Migraciones durante la Presidencia Protémpore de Chile. A pesar de estos avances, los desafíos que plantea el cambio climático y las diversas coyunturas medioambientales siguen aumentando. El riesgo múltiple que representan las amenazas naturales y sus consecuencias multidimensionales, ya sea económicas, sociales, culturales y entre otras, se han complejizado aún más debido a la pandemia que actualmente estamos viviendo y enfrentando. Finalmente, la reciente ley promulgada de migraciones y extranjería en mi país adopta también esta perspectiva, perspectiva de los derechos humanos incluyen en el párrafo sobre residencia temporal una subcategoría para extranjeros cuya residencia en Chile se justifique por razones humanitarias, dentro de las cuales la migración forzada medioambiental se prevé que sea una de ellas. Chile ha hecho avances que apuntan al carbono neutralidad, entre ellos revivicara Santiago como en la ciudad latinoamericana con la mayor flota de buses eléctricos, el cierre adelantado a las centrales de carbón, el reciente anuncio de la transformación al hidrógeno verde y el inicio formal de los procesos para proteger los medales urbanos. No obstante, estamos conscientes como país y sistema internacional que los desafíos son aún significativos, ante lo cual ninguna oportunidad debe ser pasada por alto y para lo cual nuestros países deben pensarse de un punto vista de la sustentabilidad y esa debe ser la estrategia de crecimiento y desarrollo que tengamos en el futuro. Muchas gracias. Muchas gracias, embajador, y sobre todo por haber llamado la atención sobre la importancia que Chile ha dado a los océanos y a los recursos hídricos en el marco de la lucha contra el cambio climático. Muchas gracias. Now I will follow the list of our speakers and invite to take the floor of Vice-Sarmat, the Deputy Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, a person behind the recommendations of COP24 and someone who knows very well IOM. I know and from our side we look forward to go on developing the cooperation with the Secretariat of UNFCCC together with our partners UNHCR, the platform of disaster displacement, ILO and IDMC. All right, you have the floor. Director General, it's a great pleasure, great honor for me to participate in this session. Thank you very much for your invitation and also greetings from the Executive Secretary Patricia who could not be with us today but ask me to convey to you and to all the participants her commitment to this event and going forward in preparing for the COP. But once again, distinguished panelists, members of the panel, fellow attendees, ladies and gentlemen, as I said, it's a great pleasure to address this very timely discussion which is so instrumental as we work towards this year's milestone event which is COP26 that will take place in Glasgow later this year and I look forward to seeing many of you at that event later this year. And as we work to address the links between climate change and vulnerable and displaced populations throughout the world, this event is very meaningful, extremely timely in preparation for that COP. We welcome the long-standing support and engagement of the international organization for migration with which I've had a very long relationship and extremely fortunate to be able to continue to contribute to the discussion that concerns both IOM and the UN climate change secretariat where I am at the moment. It's heartening to see us working together to strengthen the important links between human mobility and climate change under the UNFCCC and global compact on migration. Dear colleagues, we must pay particular attention to this great urgency but also the optimism and momentum that has now been generated. We are reminded that we are in crucial days that many ultimately determine whether we successfully address climate change globally or not. The recent world meteorological recent findings show that concentrations of the major greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase despite the temporary reduction in emissions in 2020 due to COVID-19. 2020 was one of the three warmest years on record despite a cooling because of the La Nina event and the past six years including 2020 are likely to be the sixth warmest years on record and many of those records are being broken as we speak. Consequently, wildfires, droughts, flooding and other extreme weather events are increasing in frequency and ferocity and they're affecting millions throughout the world including our already very vulnerable populations. That's just what's happening on land. The oceans are warming and sea levels are rising as we just heard from the distinguished panelists from Bangladesh putting millions of people directly in danger. This issue isn't going away because it's not convenient just because we are already dealing with the pandemic quite the opposite. What we are seeing is only a preview of events if we don't get our collective acts together and address climate change domestically, internationally and especially multilaterally. Not next year, not by 2050. This year of those millions of people affected the most vulnerable suffer most of all. That's why when we talk about climate change in terms of numbers, statistics and economies we must never forget that the true impact of climate change is measured in human terms. Lives and livelihood we can save. Suffering we can avoid. Every one of them will count. Where people cannot get out of harm's way we see mass displacement. People on the move not because of choice but because of desperation. Climate change is the heart and the great string tied to many of the world's most significant challenges well outlined in the SDGs and issues around displacement and migration are no different. Despite all the evidence, all the numbers, all the statistics, all the displacement, all the human misery, nations still have to move the Paris Agreement from adoption to implementation and I'll talk more about it in a minute. They still have to fulfill their commitments under it. Yes we have seen momentum recently and we congratulate nations who have submitted significantly stronger national climate action plans. Plans where resilience and adaptation efforts can and should be directly addressed. The bottom line is that nations must move even further radically and in a transformative way if we are to limit global temperatures by 1.5 degrees by the end of the century. While we must always plan for the future, we must always also focus on the task at hand. Nations must remember they have outstanding work to complete and commitments to keep this year. Remaining NDCs, nationally determined contributions must be submitted this year. Therefore COP26 this year must be a success and there is no option. We need greater ambition for mitigation, adaptation and finance this year. We need the 100 billion commitment on climate finance by developed countries who have made that promise to developing nations and that has to be fulfilled this year and to launch the work on the new long-term climate finance goal and why is that important to this panel? Let me share that with you because as I mentioned earlier climate change is not some distant threat. It is impacting vulnerable people throughout the world. Right now the Paris Agreement is now more than five years old. Develop nations have been discussing the 100 billion target as I mentioned for longer than that, more than a decade unfortunately. It's time to deliver on that commitment. It's urgently needed. We cannot and will not abandon the most vulnerable ambitions, actions now and at COP26 will deliver more climate resilience specifically for the vulnerable. We are talking about saving lives. That's why we need solutions now. 2021 must also be the year when tough decisions and significant progress need to be made by nations. Yet it also offers an unprecedented opportunity as nations build forward from COVID-19 to structure resilient, sustainable and green post-recovery economies aligned with the Paris Agreement. The milestone event for COP26 is now crucial and COP26 is nothing less than a credibility test and a trust building effort of our collective efforts to address climate change, implement the Paris Agreement and continue building ambition. To achieve success at COP26, parties, member states must fulfill promises previously made, specifically the COP16 Cancun pledges, outlining broad climate action by 2020 in particular and I repeat this, the mobilization of 100 billion commitment from developed nations to developing countries. Wrap up the outstanding negotiations items, especially relating to the Paris Agreement rulebook to ensure a swift, effective and to fulfill implementation of the agreement. And in particular, Article 6, which is to do with car crop and market markets. Many of you would know that. And then finally, to raise ambition and mitigation, adaptation and finance and bring state and non-state actors voices and their efforts together to continue build climate ambition and action. Completing this work means building trust and integrity in the multilateral process. Completing this work unleashes the potential of the Paris Agreement. Completing this work also builds resilience, especially for those at the front lines of the climate change struggle, as Prime Minister Fiji Bani Rahma has now highlighted, including those who may be displaced. It's a rare moment that cannot be lost. No nation can address climate change alone, nor can nations alone do that. This is why UN Climate Change, our Secretary, continues to work with both state and non-state actors in the spirit of what we refer to as inclusive multilaterals, to achieve a unity of vision and continue advancing the climate agenda despite pandemic related challenges. This includes through the implementation of the Executive Committee on Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage, where IOM is very active. Its purpose is to address loss and damage associated with impacts of climate change in developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to it. As custodian of the Paris Agreement, we and the Climate Change Secretary also help countries pre and adverse impacts of climate change by working with expert groups to provide technical support to all parties. And one particular group of that is the Task Force and Displacement, which is also very actively joined by IOM, and we are very grateful for that. National Adaptation Plans are yet another area where UN Climate Change Secretary helps nations plan and prepare for the impacts of climate change that affect displacement. And of course, we will continue to work with IOM on issues specific to the most vulnerable and migrants on the move. We are also committed to collaborating with the UN Network on Migration, which we are seeing a great progress that the network is making and I'm very pleased to highlight that we are working very closely with the network and would like to reinforce our collaboration there. And we are helping to co-lead the new migration and climate change activity in the UN Migration Network annual work plan and other network members with other network members. This joint work across the UN system will help us create synergies with the implementation of global compact or safe, orderly and regular migration. Colleagues, we face incredible challenges ahead, but I ask you to consider this. You consider your central part in the important times in which we live. Never has a generation had the opportunity to change so much in so little time. Our collective climate agenda is significant, our challenges many, but we must get it right. 2021 is the year we can do it, the year the world commits to making pivotal, transformational change in global climate policy and action. The year we finally move closer to implementing the Paris Agreement and the year we finally unleash its true power and potential when the world needs it the most. I encourage you to give everything you have this week and in all upcoming work to help achieve the success. And on behalf of the entire Secretary of Climate Change, I want to sincerely thank you for your work, your efforts for sharing this vision of a cleaner, greener, healthier and safer future for all. This will achieve safe, orderly and regular migration. And once again, grateful to have this opportunity, Director-General, and look forward to strengthening our ties closer, even closer than we currently have between IOM and UNEP. Back to you. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Ovid. And as the Secretary-General of the United Nations has been emphasizing, the expectations are very high and we cannot deceive the world with the outcome of the COP26. We'll do our best to support you in achieving the results that we will expect but above all that the world needs. And now I welcome Dr Yasmin Fuad, Minister of Environment of Egypt. You will join us from Cairo and you have been essential to the Egyptian initiative that tries to bring together synergies between the three Rio Conventions, Climate Change, Biological Diversity and Desertification as well as being a very authoritative voice in co-leading the Climate Finance Negotiation Track during COP24 in December 2018. So, Minister, it's a pleasure to have you with us and you have the floor. Thank you very much for inviting me to that very important dialogue on migration. Let me add the first, particularly the importance of not only linking migration to the climate change and the disaster risk management, but also linking that as a preparation to the upcoming COP26 to the vital pillar of adaptation. How can we better adapt our community, our systems, our infrastructure to be more resilient to the shocks of climate change? And from that perspective, I think that it's very important that we work together on three important points. First of all, have within the global goal on adaptation a part related to migration and the impact of those vulnerable groups that would be impacted by the displaced modalities. Number two, what will be the financial mechanisms that would be available either through the IOM or other UN agencies to plan together a full-fledged strategy on climate adaptation and displacement due to migration? Number three, which is very important, stress on the importance that jointly with our developed countries work on minimizing or de-risking the potential of the migration, not only through the financial mechanisms, but through local adaptation community-based projects on areas that we know for sure that it is very vulnerable. Let me give a very quick example on that. Egypt started like last here developing its all interactive map. And this interactive map simply says whenever we're having an infrastructure project or demonstration or establishment of a new urban city, we put that on the map to see what will be the impact of the climate change on that very small area and on the jobs that are available and on the community. Will the community be displaced? Yes or no, especially with the Nile Delta being one of the most vulnerable areas that will heavily be impacted to climate change. So finally, having technology, financial mechanisms, solidarity and coordination of having a strategy on how best can we serve those communities in the vulnerable areas and most of all having this part as part of the heart of the global on adaptation within the upcoming COP26. Thank you and over to you. Thank you so much, Minister, for having called the attention, not just on the fact that climate change impacts on vulnerable groups, especially migrants, but also those who are on the move can generate climate impacts. And we need on both cases to guarantee adaptation and mitigation of the impacts of climate change. We look forward to go on working with Egypt in this very important point of our common agenda. And in this panel, I will come to the hand, which is the last panelist, but definitely not the least. I welcome very much the Andreas Papak Konstantino, who is director for Neighborhood and Middle East, in the director general for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Co-operations, ECHO in the European Commission. We have seen very attentively the European Green Deal, and we are looking forward to the role of Europe in the next COP26. So I welcome very much your comments. Andreas, you have the floor. Thank you very much. Dear director general Vittorino, Excellencies, dear colleagues, I'm delighted to be here today. And I would like to thank the organizers of the IDM 2021 for staging this dialogue on such an important topic. The impacts of climate change are here. They're not something that we're going to face in a distant future, but they affect disproportionately the poorest and the most vulnerable people, particularly in developing countries. And climate change has become a major driver and amplifier of disasters and a source of instability. And on top of that, the COVID crisis only adds to an already very concerning situation. Climate change is a priority, as you mentioned, dear director general for the European Commission and the European Union, our ability to respond would transform lives. And equally, migration is a priority for us. And I'm glad to see that we are on the same page since migration and climate change take center stage also in the IOM's strategic vision and strategic framework. And at the European Commission level, we are working across all policies, also with like minded actors and member states in developing our thinking and preparing our actions. On the COP26, which you rightfully called an important milestone, and we fully agree, we are aware that in spite of the growing humanitarian impact of climate change, far too little climate finance is reaching the most vulnerable countries. To avoid more strain on the humanitarian system, the European Union will continue to advocate for climate action budgets to be better targeted to the specific needs and contexts of these countries and communities that are particularly vulnerable. In COP26, the European Union will submit the European Union's adaptation plans and actions under the Paris Agreement. And we will deepen our political engagement on climate change adaptation with our international and regional partners and partner countries. As you are aware, the European Union has launched a new strategy on adaptation to climate change. This adaptation strategy includes actions addressing climate change impacts in conflict and fragile settings in terms of making climate adaptation and conflict risk analysis, climate sensitive. That's a very important point for us. We also recognize the importance of an all hazards approach to preparedness in our disaster preparedness approach and our guidance notes. This includes the intersection of natural disasters and conflict, both of which can be and are exacerbated by climate change. But more evidence is needed to enhance our understanding and planning in relation to the impact of slow onset climate trends and environmental degradation and how they intersect with human mobility. This is already being addressed in the work of organizations such as yours, the IOM, and also within the UNFCC. But we need to strengthen our efforts. As you know, the EU has been a strong supporter for the inclusion of climate change and environmental factors in the text of the global compact on migration. We will continue to promote actions that integrate human mobility within disaster risk reduction policies, preparedness, and early warning mechanisms as well as climate adaptation strategies. Regional activities can also support the implementation, the follow up and review process of the climate and environmental elements of the global compact for migration at the regional level. It is our responsibility to address climate related displacement and human mobility challenges through meaningful and systemic solutions, meaning solutions that bring together early warning tools and preparedness actions for better responding to climate related emergencies. Combined with prevention, these solutions can offer sustainable futures for individuals who live in the most vulnerable environments. The EU is supporting these solutions through its climate adaptation, its disaster risk reduction and emergency preparedness set of actions. And we are investing heavily investing in early warning systems at country and community level also globally via our Copernicus emergency management service. From a humanitarian perspective, we strongly promote the integration of climate and environmental concerns into our humanitarian aid operations. Additionally, we prioritize anticipation and early actions as part of our preparedness approach to anticipate risks to reduce the needs and mitigate impacts on the most vulnerable communities. This includes climate change related risks, but also other risks that cannot be ignored. And one of them is the epidemics or conflict and considering how we are considering how risks can be interconnected. All our sectoral interventions also include climate and protection concerns. We target, as I said, the vulnerable people based on needs, irrespective of status. This has also been one of the priority objectives in our recently agreed by the College of Commissioners, EU communication on humanitarian aid adopted under the leadership of Commissioner Lenicic with the aim of mainstreaming climate change and disasters into humanitarian aid in strengthening the nexus approach and the aim of building resilience of vulnerable communities, including those who are forcibly displaced. We intend to look more into a multi-hazard preparedness approach focusing on natural hazards along with man-made threats like conflict, violence, epidemics, like COVID. We want to promote a coordinated approach that links humanitarian and development assistance. That's important to bring together risk reduction and resilience, a pure nexus approach. We are also engaging multilaterally. As you know, in 2022, the European Union will assume the chairmanship of the platform on disaster displacement. This PDD, as the acronym goes, is a unique space that can advance stronger cooperation for the protection and assistance of people displaced in the context of disasters and climate change. Moreover, we also follow closely the work of the high-level panel on internal displacement established by the Secretary General in October 2019 to identify concrete recommendations on how to better present, respond, and achieve solutions to internal displacement, including those who are displaced as part of natural disasters and climate change. The EU is among the main supporters of the HLP on internal displacement. We will work closely, dear Director General, with all the main actors at the global level to promote stronger partnerships and policy coherence, and of course with IOM. And finally, allow me to say something about the gender dimension. Climate change affects people differently depending on a number of factors. Women and girls in developing countries are particularly affected by the impact of climate change and environmental degradation. As primary users and managers of natural resources, women play an essential role for climate change mitigation and adaptation. However, they are prevented from participating equally in related governance processes for multiple reasons. The EU is determined to act on the gender dimension, and this has been confirmed by the recently adopted Gender Action Plan 3 of the European Union. And once again, many thanks for having me today. Thank you so much, Andreas. And from our side, we very much welcome the communication on humanitarian hate and the link between humanitarian assistance and development in order to find durable solutions. And I fully subscribe your approach. Women and girls are particularly eaten by climate change, but they are also our best allies in coping in concrete terms with the minimization of those impacts. That's our experience from the field. Thank you so much. At this stage, I would like to jointly thank all the panelists and now open the floor for the interventions of the member states. I have already a first list of requests for speaking. I will give the floor to the first four. I will give the floor to Mrs. Daniela Rodriguez, Vice Minister for Multilateral Affairs from Venezuela, to Cathy Olt, the Office of the Director and International Office of Migration in the Bureau of Population Refugees and Migrants, PRM of the US. Mr. Fernando de la Mora Salcedo, Coordinator of Economic, Social Human Rights and Humanitarian Section of Mexico. And last but not least, definitely, is Excellency Archbishop Ivan Zhurkovich, a permanent observer from the Oli Sea. So these are the four first speakers and then all the others want to come in and to make statements, please flag your interest. So Mrs. Daniela Rodriguez, Vice Minister of Venezuela, you have the floor. I would like to send a warm greeting to Mr. Honorable Antonio Vitorino, Director of the OIM, Honorable Ambassador Volkan Voskir, President of the 75 period of sessions of the General Assembly of the UN. Honorable Mrs. Amina Mohamed, Secretary General of the United Nations, as well as the other high-ranking representatives who accompany us today, receive a whole cordial greeting in the name of our constitutional president Nicolás Maduro Moros and our Chancellor Jorge Riaza. The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela appreciates the international organization of migrations by the implementation of this international dialogue on migration, bringing together an innovative approach to address migrations generated by the degradation of the environment and the climate, which is undoubtedly one of the biggest challenges that we must face as a human being today. The climate issue is essentially a political issue, which its main impact is reflected in the social organization processes. We will move ahead and then we will come back when the connection is re-established. So now I give the floor to Cathy Olt from PRM United States. I see her on the screen. So Catherine, you have the floor. Thank you, Director General. Thank you very much for convening this session of the 2021 international dialogue on migration. And thank you for inviting the State Department's Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration to participate in this very important discussion on the dimensions of environment and climate change and their impact on migration. The Biden administration is deeply concerned about the climate crisis, is committed to leading global efforts to address climate change and mitigate its impacts, and has affirmed the need for international cooperation and ambition to meet the moment. Climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones, droughts, and other natural disasters, is causing sea levels to rise in exacerbating resource competition and state fragility that results in conflict. These and other impacts of climate change are proving to be an important factor in forced displacement and migration decisions. The United States is committed to better understanding all of the dynamics involved and addressing the challenge of climate change, its impact on migration to displacement, and the need for planned relocation. As part of this commitment, President Biden issued an executive order in February calling on the United States government to prepare a report for the President on climate change and its impact on migration. The report's development is a whole of government process with inputs from across federal agencies and in consultation with outside experts. We are dedicated to inviting diverse perspectives from international organizations such as IOM, civil society, non-governmental organizations, academia, other governments, and impact to communities in drafting this report. The report will consider international security implications, options for protection and resettlement of individuals displaced directly or indirectly by climate change, U.S. foreign assistance to address climate change and migration, and multilateral engagement. The report will also assess and recommend ways for the United States to work collaboratively with other countries, international organizations and bodies, non-governmental organizations, and localities on the intersection of climate change and migration. The United States will use the findings of this report to inform our future policy responses, foreign assistance, and multilateral engagements targeting the nexus of climate change and migration. We will act with the urgency that the climate crisis requires or collaboratively and collectively with the full range of stakeholders to respond to the challenges posed by climate-related migration and displacement. We are thankful to IOM for your efforts in this space, and we look forward to continue collaboration with this body and other partners on this critical topic. Thank you. Thank you so much for your contribution, and we very much look forward to the presidential order execution, and I think that it is extremely important to count on the U.S. engagement in this agenda. Now I will give the floor to His Excellency Archbishop Ivan Jurkovich from the OLC. Thank you, Director General. First off, I would like to apologize on behalf of His Excellency Archbishop Jurkovich who has another engagement that came up urgently, but on his behalf I would share his statement. Director General, the Holy See delegation wishes to thank the panelists for their insightful presentations on a subject which is very dear to Pope Francis. In highlighting the effects of climate change in the lives of millions of displaced people, he affirmed that to see or not to see is the question that should lead us to the answer in action together. Unlike the COVID-19 pandemic which came upon us unexpectedly, the climate crisis has been unfolding for years, and yet it remained undressed until recently. The crippling consequences of the climate crisis is already a reality for millions of people worldwide. While climate change occurs everywhere, the capacity to respond and adapt to it varies greatly. It is the poor and most vulnerable who are disproportionately affected by the ecological and climate crisis. Director General, it is vital to acknowledge that the climate crisis has a human face. In this regard, this delegation appreciates the work carried out by IOM to highlight the impact of climate change and environmental degradation on the migratory movements through the atlas of environmental migration. When people are forced to flee because their local environment has become uninhabitable, it might look like a process of nature, something inevitable. However, the deteriorating climate is very often the result of poor choices and destructive activity of selfishness and neglect that sets humankind at odds with creation, our common home. Director General, the human reality of migration as well as the issue of climate change required by their very nature and magnitude a collective and coordinated response by the international community. No single state alone can manage the consequences, and all states are affected to some extent. In preparation for COP26, it is imperative that we address the human dimension of climate change without further delay. As Pope Francis recalled recently, there exists an ecological debt that we owe to nature, as well as to peoples affected by human-induced ecological degradation and loss of biodiversity. These issues are not simply political or economic. They are questions of justice, a justice that can no longer be ignored or deferred. Indeed, they entail a moral obligation towards future generations for the seriousness with which we respond to them will shape the world we leave to our children. Thank you, Director General. Thank you so much, and please convert my best regards to his excellency, the Archbishop. Definitely, the human dimension and the urgency of addressing this human rights approach that we follow is extremely important for us all. Let's hear from Mr. Alejandro. Thank you, Mr. Director General. I would like to thank the OEM for the organization of the Dialogue in 2021 and the distinguished panelists for their valuable presentations on a great issue of relevance. It is estimated that up to 1,000 million people would be forced to leave their homes in the next 30 years, migration to a scale never experienced before in the history of humanity. If an urgent action against the climate crisis, many places in the world will soon become uninhabitable, the increase in sea level, the bad harvest and the record temperature will boost a movement of people without precedents, so it is increasingly urgent to have a dialogue on these issues. In order to adopt integral measures that allow prevention, minimizing and addressing challenges and working on solutions related to the adverse impacts of climate change in human mobility. Ecuador has included among the objectives of its national climate change strategy and its determined national contribution, the adoption of measures to guarantee the rights of vulnerable groups with a transversal focus of gender and a management of risk that prioritizes its attention. Currently, a regulation is being worked on to make a humanitarian life for the victims of natural or environmental disasters effective. Additionally, a focus is being strengthened with new public policies such as the national plan of adaptation to climate change, the national climate financing strategy and the plan of decarbonization for 2050. Director-General, it is clear that climate change is increasing migration, however, this human dimension of the climate crisis has not yet completely captured the attention of the international community. In that sense, we consider that the United Nations Conference on Climate Change, COP26, is a great opportunity to address this problem and establish sustainable policies to guarantee the well-being, dignity and rights of people in human mobility and local communities alike in the context of climate change. This issue could be included in the COP agenda as a component of the second objective called adapting to protect communities and natural habitats, which must contemplate measures to strengthen the protection options and re-accent for people in human mobility as a result of natural disasters and climate change, having in consideration, in addition, other international instruments such as the World Bank for a safe, ordinary and regular migration and the 2030 agenda for sustainable development. We have lived a crucial decade in which it is urgent to reduce CO2 global emissions as well as to meet future needs of protection and avoid forced displacement as a consequence of climate change. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Alejandro. And now I think I'll resume the course of the events. And if I'm not mistaken, I'll give the floor to Atman Mehadji from Algeria. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. First of all, I would like to introduce myself. My name is Atman Mehadji. I am the co-director in charge of cooperation in the field of environmental and ministerial affairs. So my participation comes from representing my country. So I would like to first address you by saying what I am. Mr. Director General of the International World Organization of Migration, Mr. President of the 75th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, Madam Secretary General Adjointe of the United Nations Organization, Ladies and gentlemen and participants, I would like to thank the Secretary of the OEM for creating this opportunity to discuss a question as sensitive as the one of the migration linked to the challenges imposed by the phenomenon of climate change. We are associated with the interventions of the previous speakers to emphasize that climate change is one of the most important challenges of our time. These challenges have, of course, been aggravated by the pandemic, which has considerably reduced the range of maneuvers and the actions of governments. I would like to highlight a number of aspects in particular. First of all, I would like to highlight the question linked to climate change, which refers to an ambitious global action in terms of the fight against climate change and their negative impacts. This includes the adaptation to the negative impacts of climate change, which is a priority aspect for Algeria. We estimate that the reinforcement of the capacity for adaptation of developing countries is an effective way to reduce the movement of populations, especially those who are the most vulnerable. This is why we support the intervention of Madam the Minister of the Environment of Egypt, by highlighting the need for the definition of a global adaptation goal which is undissociable from the objective of seeing means of implementation that are adequate and sufficient for developing countries. Secondly, climate action should not divert us from the responsibility of those who are at the origin of the increased concern for global greenhouse gas emissions. In simpler terms, developing countries cannot be the consequences of this phenomenon, even though they are strongly involved in the global effort to stabilize the climate. Our partners must take the role of chief of staff. We will not only honor the commitments they have made to the Paris Agreement through the contributions of the international community, but also by providing a solid financial level on a 100 billion dollars per year in accordance with the Paris Agreement and the decisions made in the application. Thirdly, the treatment of the migratory migratory problem calls for an inclusive and holistic approach, and not particularly around certain aspects that accommodate such or such a party. So we must, and above all, attack the real cause of the problem and avoid instrumentalizing the migratory climate issues to achieve goals that are not necessarily environmental or climate nature. Fourthly, we think that it is not possible to set up new frames to face the question of migration, but to work on those who already exist. As for the need, this could be reinforced and adapted to the context of the moment, but it is necessary to be taken into account in an appropriate manner of national circumstances and of the respective capacities of the countries. Fifthly, Mr. President, we strongly support the idea that it is impossible to treat the issue of migration in a perspective that could lead to a transfer of responsibility. That is why we support with force that COP26 should be launched on a pleasant result for all parties and that would allow them to tackle the problem of global action for the climate. On that note, I would like to thank you very much for your attention. Thank you very much for your contribution. I would like to point out that the global impact on regular migration on and ordained to several elements of reflection and action lines on the link between climate change and migratory flows. Now I will give the floor to Mr. Albert Magalang from the Philippines. You have the floor, sir. Thank you very much, Director-General. So warm welcome and warmest greetings from the Philippines. Literally warm Philippines. So greetings also to the panelists, participants and organizers of this first dialogue on migration, which is a very timely and urgent international discourse dissecting the interrelationships and nexus between and among three intersecting issues. Climate change and environmental degradation and their impacts on migration. Director-General, accelerated and massive migration, original cost for catalyzed by socioeconomic drivers, is facing additional aggravation in the form of induced physical and human threats, namely accelerated climate change and environmental degradation. Of course, environmental issues affecting biophysical sources is one of the oldest migration drivers, catalyzing conflicts over scarce resources. But this seems to have been surpassed by the biggest, most comprehensive and pervasive issue of our times, which is climate change. Director-General, in all olden times, the interrelationship among environmental, social and economic issues were not so clear or even incomprehensible. But now even the rapid explosion of the COVID-19 pandemic, a health and therefore a primarily social phenomenon, has been unsurprisingly linked to the two major drivers of climate change and its aggravating impacts on an already degrading environment. In this situation, the ease of global mobility has become a major driver in the spread and breach of the severe health crisis. But Director-General, what is humanity really facing and how are we to put a stop to the unwanted interactions among this complex interrelated phenomena? If we analyze closely and honestly, the species at the center of them all, catalyzing or mediating these interactions are humans. Of course, two-thirds of the problem can probably be claimed as emanating from natural physical processes, but it cannot be ignored that humanity has altered the pace of physical and socioeconomic interactions, such that the natural order of things has been upset. The main element of the nexus of these physical and socioeconomic processes are humans. Director-General, accepting the fact that we, the human species, are key to getting everything back on track is the first important step we have to take. And we did take those first steps. We only have to reflect on what we agreed at the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992 and to execute the essence of the agreements reached, which is Agenda 21 and the two environment-centric conventions, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity. And now we have the Migration Agreement, embodied by the UN Global Compact on Migration and the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and the Members of their Families. Director-General, let us recall how ever there are differentiation in obligations between sets of parties according to cause and effects of the problems and respective capabilities of parties to determine the solutions. It has also become the mishand of the fact that setting things back on track to acceptable normalcy would incur costs that some groups of country parties would find difficult to defray. The bins of implementation in the form of finance, including for technology acquisition, development, diffusion, and transfer, as well as capacity building, are key to getting us back on pre-crisis and perhaps even on better resilience mode. The modalities of how to make this MOI flow have also been agreed upon. So let us not therefore try and renegotiate these agreed modalities. Primarily and acceptable is the shifting of obligations to parties with less and the least capabilities because they have not had the full know-how, competency, and the financial resources to execute the solutions. Looking and shifting to markets' obligation to implement the solutions may be cost-effective, but it is not fully feasible, noting that complicated prerequisites to be put in place to enable this modality to function efficiently and effectively. Director General Governments, which are parties to these agreements, have therefore to take direct responsibility for the delivery on commitments. This is the fastest route to solving the problems, whether danger points chosen are tackling the biophysical issues or the perceived more direct social entry points like through the migration route. However, as humanity is dealing with risks involving these three issues, it is the logical option to apply the risk management approach, opting for prevention or impact avoidance as the highest or most immediate objective. Secondarily, risk reduction and lastly, management of manifested impacts in terms of loss and damage when a risk materializes in its full form. Thank you, Director General. Thank you so much for your very fruitful contribution and definitely we hope that all member states will rise to their responsibilities in the COP26 as you appealed for. Now, I would like to give the floor to Junya Natranno from Japan. Sir, you have the floor. Thank you, Mr. Antonio Vittorino, Director General IOM for organizing and moderating the panel one of the IDM 2021. I'm also grateful to distinguish speakers of the panel for your insightful views on migration and displacement in the context of climate change and the environment. I'll be brief. The adverse effects of climate change and environmental degradation act as multipliers of risk by exacerbating the pre-existing vulnerabilities and insecurities that lead to migration and displacement. Addressing the threats requires a holistic approach putting people at the center and advancing human security nexus, which are the comparative advantage of the IOM. Indeed, Japan has great assets of collaboration with IOM in enhancing and realizing concept of human security on the ground addressing the issue of migration and displacement. Japan believes that assisting developing countries in their efforts to address climate change and disaster risk reduction will contribute to the prevention and future prevention of future forced migration in countries prone to climate-related challenges. In this context, Japan has provided public and private climate finance annually, amounting to approximately 1.33 trillion Japanese yen, which is equivalent to about 11.8 billion US dollars. Japan has announced that we would make contribution of up to 3 billion US dollars to the Green Climate Fund. We understand IOM is one of the important implementing agencies of this fund. Japan will continue to work closely with IOM and other partners to address migration and displacement in the context of climate and environmental change. I thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you so much for your engagement and commitment for the collaboration that we have at IOM with Japan. And the last speaker in my list is a new attempt to get Vice Minister Daniela Rodriguez. I hope that the link works now. I have had a lot of patience with us and with technology today. We were grateful to the International Organization for Migrations, the organization of this event, as well as the innovative focus. For the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, addressing the climate issue is a political issue, because its main impact is reflected in the social organization processes and they are the people who suffer indiscriminately the impacts generated by the imbalance of nature. In addition, something very interesting happens, both the climate change and the migratory crises are two children of the same father, which is the capitalist civilizatory model characterized by the instrumentalization of nature, by exploitation, by the destruction of habitats and by the exacerbation of consumption. Processes that are accompanied by a decimulation of capital and that bring as a consequence the accumulation of inequalities that undoubtedly have a nefarious impact both in nature and in society itself. That is why for us it is essential to address the structural causes of migration, as well as the structural causes that our planet is facing today, the sixth largest extinction in all natural history. We must certainly talk about the process of inequality, consumption and neoliberalism and capitalism as a civilizatory model. Now going further to the particular situation in our country, we also, Venezuela, have to face important challenges from the point of view of the fulfillment of the international commitments of this matter and to guarantee the protection of our habitats and of our people. Venezuela is a country that has subscribed and fulfills with the dispositions, with the global pact for migration and also with the United Nations Convention on Climate Change. Our country will have to face, according to studies, an increase of around five degrees by the end of the century, which will have an impact on the internal population reorganization. Currently, more than 19% of our population is in coastal areas, areas that will also be affected by these transformations in natural environments. Another additional challenge facing our country is the progressive practice of some powers to impose unilateral coercive measures that affect not only the policies of national mitigation and the preparation of challenges in the framework of the fight for climate change and migration, but also that affect the fulfillment of the established commitments in the framework of the Convention on Climate Change. We also want to take advantage of this space to make a call for cooperation, solidarity and complementarity and that the states abstain from the use of unilateral coercive measures against other countries, because this is not only against the right of the international public, but that it makes it impossible for us to develop commercial relations, fructified cooperation that we need to face and combat these global problems, which is undoubtedly not possible to face if not through the recognition of the interdependence of our countries and of our people. We reaffirmed our commitment with the beginning of shared but differentiated responsibilities, as well as the adoption of effective measures that allow us to address the structural causes of migration from a focus on the protection of human rights. We also make a call to bilateral and multilateral cooperation in this matter. It will not be possible to face these global challenges if, as a region, as countries, we do not communicate and coordinate appropriately based on the principles and purposes of the map and the sustainable development goals that undoubtedly join us in this great battle. Well, to finish, I say goodbye, again thanking the honorable Ambassador Volkan Voskiv, president of the 75 sessions of the General Assembly, the honorable Mr. Antonio Vitorino, director of the International Migration Organization and Mrs. Amina Mohammed, secretary of the United Nations. Thank you very much and you have the Venezuelan disposition to continue working together in favor of the fulfillment of the objectives that we have drawn in this matter. Thank you very much, Vice Minister, we have all listened to you perfectly, thank you very much. Well, I don't have any further requests for the floor, so I think that we are approaching an end to our first day of the IDM. I rejoice myself for the fact that everybody recognized that we are putting on the table a very relevant and timely issue and we look forward for the exchanges of views, not only among member states, but also with the civil society, with academia in the course of this IDM 2021. And therefore, from my side, I would like to reiterate my thanks to the panelists for their contribution and also to express my wish of a very fruitful debate. And to conclude my participation, I think that I will close the meeting now. Thank you so much and have a nice day. Thank you very much, Director General, thank you.