Ghana has made a strong case to developed and worst-polluter countries to support climate-vulnerable Pacific island countries, whose vulnerability has been disproportionate to their contribution to global pollution.

“The world is facing seismic changes, and nowhere is this more evident than in the Pacific Island countries,” President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said at a forum of regional leaders in Tonga, in an address delivered for him by Ghana’s Foreign Minister, Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey.

“The devastating effects of climate change can be clearly seen in your beautiful islands,” President Akufo-Addo said at the 53rd Pacific Islands Leaders Forum held in Nuku’alofa, the island capital of Tonga.

The phrase “seismic changes” and similar imagery invoked by speakers, among them UN Secretary-General Antonio Gutierrez, took on a vivid meaning when an earthquake measuring 6.9 shook Nuku’alofa, sending participants scrambling out of the main indoor stadium where the opening ceremonies had taken place with heavy overhead fixtures swinging wildly.

However, neither fatalities nor damage was reported.

President Akufo-Addo said as Chair of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF), he was “acutely aware that it is past time now for the international community to step up and play its part.”

Ghana is Chair of the CVF, which brings together 68 of the countries most highly threatened by climate change in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America and the Pacific.

He asked developed countries to take comprehensive action to address the systemic vulnerabilities of Pasifiki–Tongan for the Pacific.

With rising sea levels as a result of global warming, several islands face an existential threat.  For instance, none of Kiribati’s 33 far-flung islands stands higher than four meters above sea level, which makes the lives of its 131,000 citizens one of daily apprehension.

Last week’s earthquake in Tonga was a reminder of the tsunami, which struck the island kingdom two years ago, leaving the country’s limited communications infrastructure in smithereens, and food and clean water unavailable for days.

An estimated $1 billion is needed for the immediate climate financing needs of the region. That constitutes a significant chunk of their economic output, which President Akufo-Addo said could not be left for affected countries alone to fund.

Over the medium to long term, he pointed out, countries in this region required debt restructuring or debt relief, and a new arrangement to access concessionary finance and aid.

He called for support for the 2022 Bridgetown Initiative for the Reform of the Global Financial Architecture, geared at tackling the unique threats that Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and small coastal states face.

Ghana has been vociferous that the Paris Climate Agreement be fully implemented, with the necessary financial support for developing countries to enable them to mitigate against the economic impact of implementing the agreement’s targets.

“Ghana is committed to your comprehensive fight for resilience. We share not just the vulnerabilities you face,” President Akufo-Addo said; “your success would be the success of the entire globe. We are in this together.

“Building the economic resilience of developing countries, and SIDS in particular, is the imperative of our time,” he said.

Foreign Minister Ayorkor Botchwey also made similar calls at the 4th SIDS Conference in Antigua in May, and in bilateral engagements with Commonwealth leaders.