Island nations looking to maintain sovereignty if lands become uninhabitable due to sea level rise

The real question is, Why should rich nations be able to continue distroying poor nations with our carbon emissions, among other things?

Poor nations should sue the shit out of us!

That's a separate issue from sovereignty- plus, global warming also effects rich nations.

I'm sure it won't be long before Florida and Hawaii say bye-bye too; and when they do, we don't need to preserve their state governments.

Agreed, relocating is better than losing your life.

This is about nations that go under water still being able to retain their international sovereignty in the face of losing the land their nation was represented by. Questions will arise regarding citizenship status, laws, culture of the land, resources they used for their livelihoods and their very identity. This opens up legal questions we have have never had to consider on such a huge scale. One of those questions for me is compensation. Would those who say farmed agricultural lands now submerged be entitled to compensation for lands lost to the seas through climate change? If so, from whom? Rich nations that contributed to the effects? So I suppose the question really is, if a country sinks under the ocean, is it still considered a country? Is a country defined by its land, or its people?

thanks. u said it way better than i could have.

I dont' think it is a separate issue from sovereignty at all, especially when you tie "not having land" to "not having a country," and the developed nations are the ones who drove the planet to the problems with a rising sea level we are experiencing now, which is what covered up the land these small countries used to have with water..

You say:
"I dont' think it is a separate issue from sovereignty at all, especially when you tie "not having land" to "not having a country,""

When a government does not have land a government does not have a country.
That's what we are talking about- governments, not individuals.
The individuals then need to find another country, because the country they used to live in does not exist.

My Grandmother was from Yugoslavia, and that country no longer exists. Now, there are a number of smaller countries on the land where that country was.

In this case it is not war destroying a country, but an environmental disaster- even so, it makes no sense to pretend that the country still exists.

You say:
"and the developed nations are the ones who..."

The reason WHY this happens is irrelevant to the fact that it HAPPENED.

Let's say you get roaring drunk, get into your car, have an accident, and you hit another car with a family of four in it. You killed the mother and father, but the kids lived.

You do have an ethical (if not legal) responsibility to help those children, but it is silly to pretend their parents are still alive.

Their parents are dead, yes it's your fault, but you cannot change the fact that they are dead by pretending they are not.

The kids can't live in that house anymore- they have to move to a foster home with foster parents.

Yes, it's sad, and yes, it's unfair, and yes, it's your fault- but it's reality.

Well, I think that metaphor fit the situation pretty well, so I'm sure you understood it.

Yes, and an uncertain future for those affected by the worst of this. It comes down to our responsibility to our fellow man. Can we look beyond the politics of it to see the humanity in it? I hope, but have my doubts. There are already climate refugees in places that are going dry and the MSM says nothing.

I would not expect the MSM to cover anything related to climate change. To do that they would have to admit, at least in part, climate change is caused by humans and is a by product of corporate greed. The MSM will not risk confrontation with these entities who are equipped with a legion of "experts" whose sole job is to deny climate change. Do the people that are destroying the planet have even the smallest concern over the effects of their profiteering? I think not.

I will because this is something that needs to be addressed. The Inuit people of the Arctic are losing their home as well ( also to expanded exploration and proposed oil drilling), andi t is all they have known for centuries. Where would they go and how would they survive in a world they have never known and cannot make a living in? This is so huge and we have been so remiss in not even considering the world that will result from this. We really need to be planning for the future instead of funding useless "wars", and I do fear many will be lost.

Canada is right behind the US. Canada should take the lead on climate control because it is the melting ice from the polar ice cap that is causing the rising sea levels. Also, they are fighting to retain the sovereginty of the Northwest Passage because of this.

It may come down to the highest emitting countries needing to bear the brunt of taking in those from places that disappear that did not contribute to their nation's demise. Personally, I think that's fair. Then of course you will have the legal issue of whether those nations that do that should then get mineral rights, etc. of the abandoned island nation for doing so. In the process people will be losing their culture, their citizenship and in essence their identity. In other words, to take in refugees there has to be something in it for the country doing it and that in and of itself can lead to conflict.

Australia is undergoing drastic climate changes, and the people of Australia have not been the best custodian of resources...still aren't, as witnessed by the fact that they continue to mine coal and minerals from the ground, sending away barges full of their earth-bound resources, when Australia is a very, very old continent, and it doesn't have the kind of geology that builds up more land for it to mine and send to China.

About Obama and his deal-breaking demand to China...Obama is no friend to the environment. I would not be surprised if his deal-breaking demand was made so it would stop the agreement from going forward.

The climate-change deniers...how can someone be so self-serving as to deny the obvious as justification to continue climate-change-inducing practices and policies from which they profit?

I know, and we can't allow them to move along.

Boy, Jan someone sure has a hard on for environmental issues. I voted everyone's comments up and someone came along and voted them all down. I also voted your story up and they must have also voted it down because it was 2nd after I voted now its 3rd. What a jerk!!!!! I noticed this happend the last time you posted a story. I'm wondering if it's Merrill since it was after you had your argument with him.

Hey, children must play.

That's true but it shouldn't discourage us from continuing to inform and warn people.

Oh, it won't.