President of Republic Calls For Rapid Action To Combat Climate Change
The severity of climate change, due to the steady rise in global temperatures, threatens the continuity of human life across the planet, declared HIS Excellency Mr. Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani, the President of the Republic and Chairman of the African Union (AU), in his address to the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP29), which opened on 12 November in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.
He called on the international community to swiftly tackle climate change by strengthening international cooperation and solidarity and mobilizing funds commensurate with the challenges, considering the priorities of the least developed countries, particularly on the African continent.
Here is the text of the speech:
“Majesties, Excellencies, and Highnesses,
– Excellency Mr. Chairman of the 29th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC),
– Your Excellency the Secretary General of the United Nations,
– Ladies and Gentlemen representatives of intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations,
First of all, I would like to congratulate and thank His Excellency Mr. Ilham Aliyev, the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and through him, the Azerbaijani people, for the warm welcome and judicious organization of the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 29).
I would also like to congratulate His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the President of the United Arab Emirates, for the excellent organization of the last session in Dubai, and for the importance of the results, such as the historic agreement to activate a global climate fund to address the consequences of climate change, and the many pledges and promises of funding that accompanied it.
I would also like to congratulate His Excellency Mr. Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General of the United Nations, and all his colleagues for their efforts in ensuring the success of this summit.
– Majesties, Excellencies, and Highnesses.
– Ladies and Gentlemen
The seriousness of climate change, due to the constant rise in the planet’s temperature, threatens the continuity of human life, and indeed the continuity of life as such, on our planet.
Today, more than ever, the urgency of tackling climate change means that we all have a historic responsibility to act swiftly to remedy the situation before it’s too late.
We, in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, despite our marginal contribution (0.02%) to global warming emissions, experience the devastating effects of climate change on a daily basis through the growing phenomenon of desertification and flooding and their profound negative repercussions, which affect our social fabric, threaten our food security, and hamper our economic development.
With this in mind, we have been making great efforts to comply with the requirements of the Paris Agreement by combating desertification through the Great Green Wall Initiative, actively contributing to the Sahel Climate Commission, and adopting the charter of the Green Middle East Initiative, launched by the brotherly Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
We have also taken strong measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as imposing a tax on domestic producers, investing in increasing the size of marine, coastal, and continental reserves, and restoring degraded land.
All this is added to our considerable efforts to harness our renewable energy stock, which exceeds 4,000 gigawatts, to produce green hydrogen and increase the share of renewables in our total energy consumption, which reached 48% this year and is set to rise to 60% by 2030.
In this context, we reiterate our appeal to interested financial institutions and companies to support us in this endeavor.
In this respect, I cannot fail to point out that the African continent, as a union and as a country, is making great efforts to gradually reduce global warming, despite its small contribution to this phenomenon. It is also developing the use of renewable energies, which should be strongly supported in the field of strengthening adaptive capacity and resilience to the negative consequences of climate change.
It is imperative to strengthen international cooperation and solidarity and mobilize funds commensurate with what is at stake, considering the priorities of the least developed countries, particularly on the African continent.
While wishing every success to the work of this session, I hope that its results will contribute to reinforcing and implementing what was announced at the previous session and accelerating the mobilization of the resources needed to ensure the effectiveness of our joint efforts in the face of the various climate challenges.
Thank you, and may Allah’s peace, mercy, and blessings be upon you”.