Climate Change-induced Sea-Level Rise Direct Threat to Millions around World, Secretary-General Tells Security Council
Speakers Warn of Vanishing Coastlines, Endangered Nations, Forced Migration, Competition over Natural Resources
Speakers warned the international community that tensions are deepening as coastlines vanish, territories are lost, resources become scarce and masses are displaced, as the Security Council held its first ever open debate today on the impact of sea-level rise on international peace and security.

The world will witness “a mass exodus of entire populations on a biblical scale”, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said as he painted an alarming portrait of the emerging global security crisis that rising sea levels portend. Noting the phenomenon’s impact on lives and livelihoods in regions and ecosystems around the world, from the Caribbean to North Africa to the river basins that lie at the foot of the Himalayas, he said this will lead to ever-fiercer competition for fresh water, land and other resources.

Naming the many world cities that will be affected as the waters rise — from Cairo to New York to Santiago — he called on the Security Council to build the political will required to address the devastating security challenges arising from rising seas. The legal and human rights impact of the phenomenon is broad, he said, underscoring that they require innovative legal and practical solutions. Drawing attention to the solutions proposed by the International Law Commission, he stressed: “People’s human rights do not disappear because their homes do.”