“There is simply no more time to waste,” he said. “Talk is cheap, action speaks louder. Let’s go to Copenhagen to ‘seal the deal.’ ”
In a deeply personal appeal, Mori called climate change “a matter of survival, as a people, culture and as nations” for Micronesians and “our fellow Pacific islanders, including islanders in other parts of the world.”
“For centuries, the people of Micronesia have lived on their small islands, many less than a meter above sea level. They have enjoyed a life dependent on the bounties of the sea and the harvest from the land. They have developed a culture of respect for nature and lived in harmony with their natural surroundings. They built outrigger canoes and rigged them with sails from pandanus leaves.”
But that same ocean that has nurtured Micronesia for centuries has now become “the very instrument of our destruction,” Mori said.
