Bill Clinton: World must prepare for climate refugees
By Brian Merchant, Brooklyn, New York
22 September 2011 Some of the most dramatic impacts of climate change will be felt by the millions of people who will be forced to leave their homes: Climate refugees will flee island nations rendered inhospitable by rising sea levels, arid regions increasingly wracked by drought, and wet, low-lying areas that grow ever more prone to flooding. The international system that currently works to find refugees new homes will likely be overloaded as this occurs — we won’t be able to deal with so many mass exoduses at once. That’s why Bill Clinton thinks we need to overhaul the current system to deal with climate refugees. At a roundtable meeting with Clinton and a handful of other writers as part of the 2011 Clinton Global Initiative, I asked the 42nd President what he thought of current refugee policy in the face of our changing climate. “I think that you have to assume that because of climate change, there are going be a lot more refugees,” Clinton said. “And that the laws which exist, and the systems of support that exist, not just the US but elsewhere, were basically built for a different time when you might have a surge of refugees from this country or a surge from that country, because of a particular political upheaval or a particular natural disaster. And that’s almost certainly going to not work now.” […] “I think that in general we should become more open to immigration again,” Clinton said. “Keeping people in limbo is a waste of human potential.”
