Vatican calls for debt cancellation for small island states May 30, 2024

Small island states, which are on the frontline of climate change

By AFP - Agence France Presse

Vatican calls for debt cancellation for small island states

The Holy See has called on developed nations to cancel the debt of small island states, which are on the frontline of climate change, Vatican News reported on Wednesday.

“Debt cancellation is not just a matter of economic or development policy,” said Vatican representative Robert Murphy during a four-day conference on Small Island Developing States (SIDS).

It is “a moral imperative rooted in the principles of justice and solidarity,” he said on Tuesday.

SIDS are extremely vulnerable to climate change but are not rich enough to stop it on their own.

“The growing debt burden faced by SIDS is becoming increasingly unsustainable,” Murphy told the summit in the Caribbean nation of Antigua and Barbuda, according to Vatican News.

“Moreover, debt perpetuates a cycle of dependency that undermines the ability of SIDS to address pressing issues such as poverty eradication and climate change,” he told the conference of 39 states, whose populations number around 65 million people.

Earlier this month, Pope Francis called on rich countries to cancel the debts of low-income countries not out of “generosity” but out of “justice”.

Francis, who has made environmental protection a key theme of his papacy, said that rich nations have an “ecological debt” due to the “disproportionate use of natural resources by certain countries over long periods”.

ide/gv