Republic Of Kiribati Will No Longer Exist In 2050; Slow-Motion Shutdown Under Way
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The reality of Ioteba's life compelled the President of Kiribati to buy 5,000 acres of land in Fiji earlier this year. President Anote Tong bought the dense forest for AUS$8.77m (¤6m), with a view to relocating his entire country 2,000 miles away "when the time is right and when it becomes necessary." The 62-year-old western-educated politician of Chinese heritage is sitting in the presidential office, wearing the traditional hakama. "You know it as a man skirt," he smiles. It is lunchtime on the last day of the parliamentary session and Tong is visibly exhausted. "Members of parliament are coming in and they are saying, 'What can you do, what can the government do?'"
Members of parliament have travelled for several days from the outer islands by traditional canoe to give first-hand accounts of the impact of the summer high tides. Communities have been forced to relocate to other parts of the island. Many more are requesting help to move. "Quite frankly, we don't have the resources to respond adequately,"he says, throwing his arms up in exasperation.
Tong's quiet desperation is rehearsed and resigned. "People who have the mountains behind them all their life will never understand." The threat of being "swamped any moment" has conceived a continuous sense of vulnerability. There is nowhere to go when the high waves come.
The concept of stairs is foreign to most Kiribati inhabitants. The solitary escalator in the former British protectorate is manned by an officious man with a wooden stick. His full-time job is to show the supermarket shoppers how to step on and off the moving steps. Dozens of locals stand around watching their neighbours grip the handrail as they mechanically descend heights alien to their natural senses. On the bus from the airport in Fiji, Kiribati children wore silent expressions of outright bewilderment, pointing to the earth in the sky.
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http://www.independent.ie/world-news/asia-pacific/in-deep-water-the-first-country-in-the-world-to-surrender-to-global-warming-30735212.html
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I hope someone does the same for the other small islands that are threatened. 
...transporting entire communities intact, with cultures and languages preserved and respected.
Otherwise these unfortunate people, their languages, and their cultures will simply die.
I don't think "assimilation" is the proper answer. Cultural adaptation yes, but assimilation is what the Borg of Star Trek did, and what empires have always tried to impose on the people they conquered.
The U.S.A. and Australia have a terrible record in this respect, punishing indigenous people for speaking their own languages and forcing some version of Christianity upon them.
Even internally, within the United States, this will be a problem, as it was in the 'thirties.
