More than 300 million people are already seriously affected by the gradual warming of the earth and that number is set to double by 2030, the report from the Global Humanitarian Forum warns.
"For the first time we are trying to get the world's attention to the fact that climate change is not something waiting to happen. It is impacting seriously the lives of many people around the world," the forum's president, former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, told CNN.
The report, titled "Human Impact Report: Climate Change -- The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis" comes just six months before the United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen to forge a post-Kyoto climate agreement for 2012 and beyond.The report's startling numbers are based on calculations by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that the Earth's atmosphere warmed by 0.74 degrees Celsius (1.33 degrees Fahrenheit) from 1906 to 2005, with much of that increase coming in recent decades. The panel predicts that by 2100 temperatures will have increased a minimum of two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels regardless of what's agreed in Copenhagen.
"No matter what," the report concludes, "the suffering documented in this report is only the beginning." A rise of two degrees, it says, "would be catastrophic."
Of the 300,000 lives being lost each year due to climate change, the report finds nine out of 10 are related to "gradual environmental degradation," and that deaths caused by climate-related malnutrition, diarrhea and malaria outnumber direct fatalities from weather-related disasters."ORIGINAL SOURCE: CNN.com
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Forwarding action alert; please repost:
-- Please forward to anyone near Cornwall --
The Mohawk community of Akwesasne is currently blockaded by both American and Ontario Police fores on either sides of the border, due to their defiance of the order to have the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) be allowed to carry lethal weapons on the border that strattles their community. This territory is both in New York and Ontario, and traffic (in particular residents of the reserve) have been prevented from entering this community.
The residents of this community are asking people to attend immediately, if possible, to witness, record, or otherwise exhibit solidarity with the Mohawk community as they resist this particular attempt to reduce their rights and self-determination.
For those who can, please make your way to this border community-- near Cornwall, Ontario.
For more information, please contact Sandra Cuffe (to get interviews, updates, etc from community members) at:
514 583 6432, or Sandra C lavagabunda27@yahoo.es
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