ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will act as the vice chairman for the upcoming United Nations climate change conference that is scheduled to take place in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, in November, the PM Office announced in a statement on Monday.
The Conference of Party – or COP27 – conference will bring together international officials, climate change experts and civil society activists from across the world and will be chaired by Egypt.
According to the official statement, the prime minister was invited to co-chair COP27 by Egypt’s President Abdul Fattah El-Sisi since Sharif ran an international campaign to raise awareness about climate change in the wake of the recent floods in his country.
“World leaders, heads of governments and top officials of international financial institutions and think tanks will participate in the meeting,” said the PM Office while pointing out that Pakistan had “received this honor” among 195 UN member states. “This will be the 27th meeting organized by the United Nations regarding the problems of environmental changes and their solutions.”
The Pakistani premier minister will jointly chair the conference with the Egyptian president and the prime minister of Norway.
“After the recent floods, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif raised an effective voice on climate change at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Council of Heads of State and Government and the 77th Session of the United Nations General Assembly,” the statement added. “Other countries supported his proposals to raise the issue of environmental changes at the SCO.”
The recent floods in Pakistan were triggered by torrential monsoon rains which started in June and lasted for almost three months.
The erratic weather pattern was widely attributed to the challenge of global climate change and claimed about 1,700 lives and affected 33 million people.
The country lost billions of dollars after the floods destroyed houses, farmlands, livestock and other public infrastructure.
The United Nations General Assembly recently expressed solidarity with Pakistan while asking the international community to increase aid to support the country’s long-term recovery.
UN chief António Guterres, who also visited Pakistan and witnessed all the devastation, warned in a recent statement the situation was “going from bad to worse” since the country was “on the verge of a public health disaster” after the recent climate catastrophe.