Samoa and the Alliance of Small Islands States show climate security is also about loss and damage

Photo Source: Mario Tama/Getty Images. Retrieved from lowyinstitute.org

Samoa assumed a leadership role in January this year as chair of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), the negotiating bloc for small island developing states. Samoa is well placed to elevate the experience of Pacific Islands to influence global support on climate change security, with action on “loss and damage” talks as a special focus.

AOSIS has long been instrumental across the United Nations system on the climate change and development agenda, notably in a recent Security Council climate debate.

In 1989, 14 island states met in the “Small States Conference of Sea Level Rise” and adopted the Malé Declaration for collective action against a threat to their very existence. The declaration would establish a coalition of small island states and trigger a global campaign for a treaty on climate change, ensuring that the vulnerability of small island developing states was recognised and that special support was considered for their sustainable development. Despite the many differences among these countries, group awareness of a common danger brought them together.