Marshall Islands' Climate Change Dilemma: If It Vanishes Beneath Rising Sea Levels, Is It Still A Na

[Judi Lynn]

Marshall Islands' Climate Change Dilemma: If It Vanishes Beneath Rising Sea Levels, Is It Still A Nation?
CHARLES J. HANLEY | 12/ 6/10 02:27 PM |

CANCUN, Mexico — Encroaching seas in the far Pacific are raising the salt level in the wells of the Marshall Islands. Waves threaten to cut one sliver of an island in two. "It's getting worse," says Kaminaga Kaminaga, the tiny nation's climate change coordinator.

The rising ocean raises questions, too: What happens if the 61,000 Marshallese must abandon their low-lying atolls? Would they still be a nation? With a U.N. seat? With control of their old fisheries and their undersea minerals? Where would they live, and how would they make a living? Who, precisely, would they and their children become?

For years global negotiations to act on climate change have dragged on, with little to show. Parties to the 193-nation U.N. climate treaty are meeting again in this Caribbean resort, but no one expects decisive action to roll back the industrial, agricultural and transport emissions blamed for global warming – and consequently for swelling seas.

From 7,000 miles (11,000 kilometers) away, the people of the Marshalls – and of Kiribati, Tuvalu and other atoll nations beyond – can only wonder how many more years they'll be able to cope.

More:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/06/marshall-islands-climate-_n_792799.html

[Ian David]

1. Here's another question: What if there's a coastal mountain in a country...

... and rising sea levels isolate the formerly coastal mountain, turning it into an island, outside the territorial limits of the mainland its originating country?

[TroubleMan]

2. I would say it that it would remain part of the same country,

barring any huge cultural or political changes. Hawaii is part of the USA, even though there's an ocean between them. The same thing with the Netherlands and the Netherlands Antilles, and many other Caribbean islands that are politically part of Europe.