Pakistan PM wants to work with India on climate change

DAVOS, 26 January 2012 (The Times of India) – Pointing out that Pakistan has “excellent” relationship with India, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Thursday said cooperation between the two to tackle climate change was “doable”. He said Islamabad wants to work with New Delhi on this front. “Yes, certainly there can be cooperation. We have excellent relationship with India and we want to work together,” Gilani said when asked if India and Pakistan can work together to tackle climate change. “We have been having a number of delegations from both countries on various matters like finance and industry. Certainly cooperation is doable”, Gilani said during a panel discussion on climate change at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2012. Earlier in his address, Gilani said Pakistan has been hit by “horrible” droughts and floods last year and sought a “global fund” to tackle the climate risk issues. “It (climate change) is quite visible in my country. We have suffered both drought and heavy rains in past one year. It was horrible, not just by our estimates but also as per the estimates of World Bank and Asian Development Bank,” Gilani said. “There has to be global solution to these problems. The first step we can take is establishing a global fund to tackle the climate risk issues and Pakistan would be happy to partner,” Gilani said. The United Nations has already proposed a USD 100 billion Green Climate Fund. The fund was central to agreements reached in 2010 by UN treaty negotiators in Cancun, Mexico. “If the glaciers in Himalayas melt, there will be huge floods in Pakistan,” he said adding that Pakistan has taken some steps by creating a disaster management cell which he himself was overseeing. Gilani arrived here yesterday from Islamabad. This is his first visit outside Pakistan since the memo scandal erupted late last year throwing his government in a political whirlpool that even threatened his continuity at office. One year after the worst flooding disaster in the history of the region, more floods triggered by heavy rains had devastated parts of Southern Pakistan last year.

Pakistan wants to work with India on climate change: Yousuf Raza Gilani