Oriented on making people closer

Human-induced climate change is not only an environmental phenomenon, but also one of the main security threats of the 21st century. Rising sea levels, more frequent weather extremes and the growing risk of environmental disasters are increasingly depriving people all over the world of their livelihoods. Climate change is therefore becoming an ever-greater risk multiplier that threatens the stability of countries and societies.

Climate change also poses a growing security risk in Central Asia and Afghanistan, where it has a particularly severe impact on glaciers and on natural resources such as water, land and soil. This has consequences for food security and affects migrant flows and the stability of the region as a whole.

Being the close and long-term development partner of the region, Germany will launch regional initiative on climate and security “Green Central Asia”. The launch event will take place in Berlin on 28 January 2020 at the conference “Central Asia - Enhancing environment, climate and water resilience”, organized by the Federal Foreign Office of Germany.

The minsters of foreign affairs of Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan have been invited for the forum. The conference will brought together the representatives of such international organizations as EU, UNRCCA, GIZ, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea.

The aim of the initiative is to support a dialogue in the region on climate change and the risks associated with it, thus fostering regional integration between the six countries involved.

The Green Central Asia will allow to create better access to information and risk analyses in order to enable countries to assess the impact of climate change more accurately and to take preventive measures.

At the same time, dialogues and workshops will increase decision-makers’ abilities to address climate-change related security risks adequately at the national and regional levels. Scientific collaboration will support the expansion of national expertise, with the aim of identifying adequate solutions to the challenges posed by climate change.

A high-level political dialogue on the nexus between climate change and security, as relevant to foreign policy, will actively support the implementation of Green Central Asia.

Green Central Asia will be realized in line with the new EU strategy on Central Asia as this strategy focuses on strengthening countries’ resilience to internal and external risk factors such as climate and environmental factors.

Elvira KADYROVA