The climate crisis has in recent years often taken center stage at the UN General Assembly in New York. But this year, speeches and chatters in the hallowed UN halls and chambers show something different. While a high-level meeting to address the escalating threats of sea level rise on Wednesday has been billed as particularly critical for small island developing states and low-lying coastal areas around the world, talks in the main General Assembly hall heavily focused on the deepening global conflicts in the Middle East, Ukraine and Sudan. In his final General Assembly speech, US President Joe Biden on Tuesday only briefly addressed the issue, touting signing into law the country's largest ever investment in clean energy. Blocks away from the UN building, however, climate activists rallied, calling for an end to fossil fuels alongside pro-Palestinian protesters. A Climate Week side event with White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi was even disrupted by activists who took over the stage.
Their sense of urgency doesn't need much explaining. As speeches and bilateral meetings unfold, many countries present at the global gathering are already facing the escalating impacts of the climate crisis, including deadly floods in Europe, drought-fueled water shortages in Africa, and devastating fires in the Amazon. Earlier this week, Ecuador's president had to skip his UNGA speech and rush home to respond to a wildfire raging capital city Quito. The one group that has remained constant in calling attention to the climate emergency has been the small island nations. Leaders and delegates dressed in their traditional islander regalia stand out in the sea of suits that fill the chambers. Their impassioned speeches often surpass the allotted speaking time they've been given. To these island nations, a high-level meeting on sea level rise is "not just an agenda item — this is a matter of survival," Panapasi Nelesone, deputy prime minister of Tuvalu, said in his speech. CNN climate reporter Rachel Ramirez writes for Meanwhile from the sidelines of UNGA on Manhattan's East Side. |
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Smoke rises from fires in the Guapulo neighborhood of Quito, Ecuador, on Sept. 24, 2024. Carlos Noriega/AP |
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At a high-level ministerial meeting on UNGA's sidelines on Wednesday, Nisreen Elsaim recounted cradling her nine-month-old baby at home in Khartoum "immobilized by the chaos" in the city -- enduring three weeks without food, water or electricity. Malnutrition and widespread flooding—of an area the size of Germany—are now causing a desperate humanitarian crisis in her war-torn country, the Sudanese peace and climate activist told diplomats.
Over a year of brutal fighting between Sudan's military and a paramilitary group has left at least 18,000 people dead and displaced more than 10 million others since April 2023. Earlier this month, a UN inquiry into the conflict found both warring factions have committed "an appalling range" of human rights abuses that "may amount to war crimes."
A staggering 26 million people are now facing acute hunger in Sudan — three times the population of New York City, per Edem Wosornu, director of the operations and advocacy division at UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. In May, the World Food Programme said people in the region were forced to eat grass and peanut shells to survive. Months later, the war and its spiraling humanitarian effects remain overshadowed by crises in Ukraine and Gaza, London-based Kholood Khair, a Sudanese policy analyst and founding director of Confluence Advisory, told CNN's Aditi Sangal. "Sudan is the world largest humanitarian, hunger, displacement and protection crisis, and it is all happening simultaneously," said Khair, who is in New York this week to advocate for more attention to the crisis. "But there's no urgency to address it." "It's a test for multilateral systems — UN, African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development in Eastern Africa," Khair said. "If they cannot address what's happening in Sudan, then they will fail and it's a make or break moment for them; these institutions will remain but their legitimacy will be gone." |
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Vice President Kamala Harris holds a 12-point lead over former President Donald Trump among voters younger than 35 – a group that's largely dissatisfied with the influence it holds in American politics, but remains optimistic about the country's future, according to new CNN polling conducted by SSRS. CNN's Ariel Edwards-Levy reports: Harris leads Trump 52% to 40% among these likely voters younger than 35. That still suggests a tighter race among this group than in 2020, when President Joe Biden ended up with a 21-point margin among the same age group, according to exit polls. But it marks a return to more typical voting patterns after polls earlier in the year showed Biden struggling to rally youth support for a second term. The gender gap seen across voters of all ages is present among this group as well. Where female likely voters younger than 35 prefer Harris over Trump, 53% to 39%, male likely voters are closely divided. And among registered voters, young women are 15 points likelier than men to express a positive view of Harris. Polling on young voters' presidential preference has ranged significantly over the past year. While most recent polling suggests a return-to-form for young voters favoring the Democratic nominee following Harris' rise to the top of the ticket, these surveys offer varying pictures of the scale of Harris' advantage with this group. The latest CNN poll surveyed a larger sample of younger voters than is typical in most national polls in order to have greater confidence in the results among this critical voting bloc. It suggests a slightly wider margin for Harris among likely voters under 30 (55% Harris to 38% Trump with that group) than among those age 18 to 34. |
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Thanks for reading. On Thursday, Biden and Harris meet separately with Zelensky at the White House. A task force investigating Trump's attempted assassination holds its first hearing on Capitol Hill. Lawyers for Trump appear in a Manhattan courtroom to appeal the $454 million judgment handed down by Judge Arthur Engoron earlier this year. Pope Francis visits Luxembourg. |
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