Moving from words to action in tackling climate change On December 12, 2015 at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris, France, under the leadership of the then President Hollande, the historic Paris Agreement on climate change was adopted. It was a historic agreement for a number of important …

Developing climate resilient and migrant-friendly secondary cities The second Annual National Conference on Urban Resilience was just held in Dhaka and in three days it brought together several hundred people from different sectors including the central government, local government, mayors and town planners, as well as researchers, academics, NGOs and private sector actors to discuss the future pathways to build …

Fiji and Poland launch Talanoa Dialogue at COP23 The 23rd Conference of Parties (COP23) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) ended in Bonn, Germany, on Saturday morning, as negotiations ran overtime by a day. While the event was held in Germany, the official host of COP23 was in fact Fiji, and the President of the COP …

What to look forward to in COP23 I have just arrived in Bonn, Germany to attend the 23rd Conference of Parties (COP23) under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) being held here for the next two weeks. The annual COP takes place in November or December each year and is hosted by a country in a different …

State of climate change discourse in the United States I have just returned from a three-week lecture tour of universities in the United States which took me to New York (Columbia University), Washington, DC (George Washington University), Maryland (University of Maryland) and Nashville (Vanderbilt University). I also participated in the weeklong annual Resilience Academy at the Woodrow Wilson Centre and …

The realities of Rohingya refugees – What do we do next? In the last few days I had the opportunity to visit the Rohingya camps in Ukhia near the Myanmar border to observe the conditions of the refugees as well as the environment of the area. I will share some very preliminary observations on the situation. The first is of …

From donors to partners Our relationship with developed countries needs to change so that we can become an active partner from a passive recipient of aid In my column last week, I wrote about the prospects of Bangladesh graduating from Least Developed Country (LDC) status in the next few years and the need to anticipate the consequent loss of access …

Moving from development finance to climate finance Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has declared her intention to make Bangladesh graduate from being a Least Developed Country (LDC) within the next few years and the government has already formally notified the United Nations of this intent. LDC is a UN-recognised category that brings with it certain privileges such as access to grants …

Loss and damage from climate change Ensuring compensation for victims The recent succession of hurricanes in the Caribbean and floods in South Asia have taken the world over the tipping point in acknowledging that human induced climate change is not only real but is happening already. Of course there are still some deniers like US President Donald Trump and his …

While he was still running to become President, Trump Tweeted that climate change was a Chinese hoax. Then after he was elected there was speculation that he might change his mind. This became especially acute when his daughter Ivanka held a high profile meeting with former Vice President Al Gore in which Trump also dropped in. Then the Whitehouse held …