Climate change increases peace and security risks.
As Olaylar informs that Matti Lehtonen, adviser at the UN Environment Programme, said this during a discussion of the draft policy document "Shaping Safer and More Resilient Cities: Urban Climate, Peace and Security" held as part of the 13th session of the World Urban Forum (WUF13) in Baku.
"If you have heard the concept of climate, peace and security, you would most likely associate it with climate acting as a risk multiplier. This is also the main approach we use in the Climate Security Mechanism (CSM). But in fact, this concept is broader. It covers the interactions between climate pressures and climate shocks, existing peace and security dynamics, as well as socio-economic systems. This is a system of cascading effects with complex and multilayered chains of cause and effect. In our view, we do not see a direct and simple causal link here. It would not be correct to say that atmospheric events directly cause people to kill each other. The human factor plays an important role here, and this factor is highly complex both in terms of modelling and quantification. In general, conflicts usually cannot be explained by a single cause. Therefore, climate and environmental factors should be considered in a broader context when trying to understand peace and security issues, namely as one of many factors. This is exactly the more nuanced and complex view that the CSM approach seeks to present," he said.
Lehtonen also said climate change is being viewed as a higher priority on the security agenda.
"Climate-related security risk is one of the topics being discussed increasingly often. The 5th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) also emphasized human security and its impact on broader understandings of security. However, in some regions, this issue is more pronounced. Here, the chr("39")securitizationchr("39") aspect of security comes to the fore. In other words, the issue of climate, peace and security elevates climate to a higher political and strategic level; climate impacts are no longer viewed simply as an environmental concern, but as a security issue requiring higher priority and resources. Of course, the main goal is to reduce emissions and address the root cause of the problem. At the same time, there is a wide range of important action in climate adaptation that is not directly linked to peace and security. It is important to implement these steps," he said.
