Topic: Assistance for Nations Facing Total Territory Loss
Country: Gabon
Delegate Name: John Bradford
School: Royal Oak High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Gabon position papers GLIMUN 2011 committees
Gabon believes, as the United Nations believes, that all people are entitled to basic human rights. Gabon has sympathy for those nations facing creeping shorelines and vanishing coasts. However, Gabon believes the primary concern is not for immediate environmental solutions, but for solutions for the people of affected nations and what they must do to survive.
When the word “refugee” is uttered, immediately the word “war” comes to mind, but not for the people of nations like Tuvalu. With many individuals fleeing every year, local nations are faced with the difficult decision of dealing with refugees that soon will not have a home to return to. Gabon believes in the full entitlement of human and political rights of these people and urges recipient nations to feel the same. As the United Nations, all we can do is encourage local nations to open their borders to accommodate these unfortunate people and provide at least partial citizenship for them.
Gabon believes that nations already doing something prevent rising sea levels must do more to further slow this incredibly grim future sinking nations are facing. There may be no way of escaping the future of an underwater Tuvalu, but there is still hope to slow its descent. Many nations are doing what they can to lower carbon emissions, but some things in this world are inevitable, and no dump trucks of sand can permanently solve this problem, nor can any amount of emissions regulations. It is a sad truth for these nations facing territory loss, but all that can be done be for them is for nations to accept their refugees with open arms.
