Speaking at a \u201csautalaga\u201d \u2013 an exchange of views around a meeting table \u2013 at the end of a three-hour visit, a string of leaders argued the world must stand behind a 2023 agreement, made at a UN summit in Dubai, to transition away from fossil fuels. More recently it has faced wavering support, with pushback particularly led by oil-producing nations.<\/p>\n
Tuvalu is among a handful of countries most at risk from the climate crisis. A collection of three reef islands and six atolls, it is mostly less than 2 metres above sea level. About half its population of 10,600 live in a corner of Funafuti.<\/p>\n
The visitors heard from Melelusi Sokotia, a 13-year-old local student. She said her friends dreamed of \u201cbecoming teachers, doctors, builders\u201d but spent their lives wondering if their island would be safe to live on when they were adults. \u201cWe all have one single dream: to grow safely here in Tuvalu,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are not asking for peace. We are asking for help and partnership. Please work together to protect small islands like ours.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Fijian prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka, said with the world on the brink of overshooting the goal of limiting global heating to 1.5C \u2013 agreed in the 2015 Paris agreement \u2013 and facing a super El Ni\u00f1o, it must bring forward plans to cut emissions. \u201cThat is not radical. It is in line with our agreement, our obligation, and the scientific reality,\u201d he said. \u201cThe transition away from fossil fuels was agreed to by all of us in Dubai. It is not a new ask, and it is not open for renegotiation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tuvalu\u2019s prime minister, Feleti Teo, stressed island states needed faster access to global climate finance to deal with worsening extreme events. \u201cWhy should countries like Tuvalu take on more debt to protect ourselves from a climate crisis we did so little to cause? We should not have to borrow our way out of a crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n
The visit came less than a week after an Australian state regulator approved the latest of more than 30 fossil fuel developments to have been given the greenlight in the country in less than five years.<\/p>\n
Albanese, attending his first UN climate conference as prime minister since his election in 2022, said the message from the Tuvalu trip was that \u201cclimate change must be understood as being something more than about science or targets\u201d.<\/p>\n
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