German envoy: Fossil fuel burning by rich nations aided Tacloban flooding

Germany's special envoy for climate has blamed the fossil fuel emissions of rich countries and corporations for climate change, which has been causing more destructive storms.

During her visit to Tacloban City, the hardest-hit province of Typhoon Yolanda in 2013, German State Secretary and Special Envoy for International Climate Action Jennifer Morgan “recognized” her country’s responsibility in contributing to global warming.

“I think the people of Tacloban have suffered tremendously from the impacts of climate change but they haven’t done anything to cause the problem. So it’s the burning of fossil fuel particularly by wealthy nations and wealthy individuals that have caused what has happened here,” Morgan said in JP Soriano’s report on “24 Oras” on Monday.

2019 data from Our World showed upper middle-income countries and high-income countries were the largest contributors to greenhouse gases that cause global warming and climate change.

“Germany recognizes its responsibility for contributing to global warming; for contributing to the destruction of the climate crisis; for waiting too long to act; for listening too long to the voice of the people and communities that are hit the hardest by the climate crisis,” she said. 

“I came to Tacloban today to say 'we hear you, the world hears you’…It is an injustice. It is hard to bear and that’s impossible to accept, the world owes something to the people of Tacloban and you people of Tacloban have the right to claim it,” the official added.

Morgan was among the guests in the Climate Talks hosted by the University of the Philippines Visayas Tacloban College. Apart from the school, she visited the Mangrove Eco Park in the city and the memorial site at the San Joaquin Parish in Palo, Leyte where the victims of the supertyphoon were memorialized.—Sundy Locus/LDF, GMA Integrated News