“South Asia is one of the hotspots of the global climate crisis. People living in these hotspots are 15 times more likely to die from climate impacts,” UN chief Antonio Guterres said on Tuesday. appealing for $160 million to help more than five million victims of the catastrophic floods.

A recent study thus predicted that the probability of particularly strong monsoons on the Indian subcontinent would be multiplied by six by the end of the century, even if the emissions of greenhouse gases responsible for global warming fell.

“This is not an accident. Science shows that the frequency and impact of these disasters will increase, and we must be prepared for this,” insists Abel Munir, Pakistan’s ambassador to South Korea and current chairman of the G77. China, main group of emerging and poor countries in climate negotiations.

These countries, which contribute little, or have historically contributed little, to emissions, bear the brunt of the negative effects of climate change on the front line, and have been calling in vain for years for a specific financial mechanism to compensate for the “losses and damages” they are enduring. already. A file that they want to put back on the table at the COP27 to be held in early November in Egypt.

– Moral pressure –

“We’re going to keep the moral suasion going. But it seems to me that a lot of political and moral suasion also needs to come from within these countries,” Munir said.

Pakistan has contributed less than 0.5% to total greenhouse gas emissions since the industrial revolution, Pristina Dahl, climate manager at the US-based NGO Union of Concerned Scientists, told AFP. .

The United States, one of the main opponents of specific financing of “losses and damages”, is responsible for 25% of these historical emissions.

“Understanding the causes of disasters like the floods in Pakistan is an important step towards holding rich countries accountable for the changes they have caused around the world,” Dahl said.

It is in particular the fear of opening the way to a legal challenge that inspires the rejection of specific financing by developed countries. They believe that compensation for the impacts of global warming can be part of a global mechanism.

But the countries affected retort that the promises of climate finance from the richest – 100 billion dollars a year – have still not been kept.

Even as they have spent trillions to support their economies in the face of the Covid pandemic.

The subject had been at the origin of strong tensions during the last COP in Glasgow, ultimately leading to the decision to create… a framework for “dialogue” until 2024.

But faced with the multiplication of disasters, many countries want to go faster.

– Economic disaster –

Before the floods, for example, Pakistan was hit in March by a heat wave with temperatures of up to 50 degrees, hitting crops and livestock hard.

Heat wave which has also accelerated the melting of the many glaciers in the country. This could have swelled the rivers and aggravated the floods.

Which floods have again hit the agricultural sector, drowning the fields and carrying 800,000 head of cattle, underlines Mr. Munir.

By adding the ravaged infrastructure – 200 bridges and 3,500 kilometers of roads washed away – the country faces an economic catastrophe in addition to a humanitarian one.

But to support it, there is only the appeal for emergency humanitarian aid from the UN. Even though the Pakistani government already estimates the reconstruction costs at some ten billion dollars.

“Post-disaster humanitarian aid can help, but developing countries must be able to count on substantial long-term resources in the face of the growing impacts of climate change,” insists Ms. Dahl.

“It is an established fact: all this is due to climate change,” adds Mr. Munir. “So the funding has to come from somewhere. And we know where it is somewhere.”