Daily Times

Lamenting that the world has not given due attention to the environmental issues it faces, Prime Minister Imran Khan on Saturday reminded the rich countries of their onus in capping the hazardous carbon emissions and contributing resources to help fight the climate challenges.

Addressing a ceremony of World Environment Day 2021 here at the Convention Center, hosted by Pakistan, the prime minister said the governments across the world could not implement their policies of environment protection and preservation unless fully backed by their masses. The whole nation, especially, the young and students must participate in his government’s launched initiatives like Ten Billion Trees and Clean and Green Pakistan, he added. Pakistan has been ranked among the few countries of the world which had been deeply worried for the future of its coming generation due to increasing global warming impacts, he observed.

Telecast globally, the event featured the special messages of Chinese President Xi Jinping, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and address by Executive Director of the UN Environment Program Inger Anderson besides State Minister Zartaj Gul and SAPM Amin Aslam.

The prime minister underlined the need for making strenuous and sustained efforts to preserve the planet earth for the future of the coming generations. He regretted that in Pakistan too, in the past, no attention was paid to counter the issues like environment pollution, depletion of natural resources and deforestation. He said that they had successfully planted one billion trees in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in the last five years.

Imran Khan urged the world to fight back for ecosystem restoration during the next decade and particularly reminded the rich countries to assist the poor ones bearing the brunt of their immense carbon emissions. “Pakistan has minimal contribution in carbon emission. The rich countries responsible for huge carbon emission have the responsibility to at least provide fund so that the countries like ours may fight global warming, improve our environment. The issue is resources gap,” he said.

Explaining the resource constraints in Pakistan, the prime minister said during the pandemic, Pakistan with a population of 220 million could only scrape around US $ eight billion for relief package while 330 million nation of United States doled out a package of US $ 4,000 billion to its people. He told the world that half of Pakistan’s revenue went to debt servicing leaving the government with insufficient resources to support people’s health, education, security and other expenditures.

He reiterated that the resource rich countries should support the developing countries who were fighting the war of climate change. He particularly thanked the United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations Secretary General for repeatedly pressing the rich countries to take their carbon responsibilities. He said Pakistan was also making efforts to further reduce its already minimal emissions by switching 30 percent of its all vehicles to electric transmission and would ensure 60 percent of its power generation through renewable resources by 2030. He said it was an honor for Pakistan to host World Environment Day which depicted the recognition of Pakistan’s efforts and inclusion among few countries concerned for a better environment for next generations.