MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Escazú Agreement poses new challenges to Latin American countries

Human greed is the cause of the current climate crisis, Fernández said

Argentine President Alberto Fernández Wednesday opened the Second Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP2) of the Escazú Agreement at the Kirchner Cultural Center in Buenos Aires. The event will last until April 21.

It will also be the first time Chile participates as a full member after President Gabriel Boric Font signed last March his country's adhesion to the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean adopted in Escazú, Costa Rica, on March 4, 2018, and entered into force on April 22, 2021.

“What summons us today is what the Escazú Agreement summoned us for: to involve civil society in a problem that the world is experiencing, a tremendous climate crisis,” President Fernández said.

“The cause of the crisis is human greed, unbridled financial capitalism that, in order to make money and increase profits, does not measure the damage it is causing,” he added while insisting Latin America and the Caribbean were “climate creditors” because these countries do not account for the bulk of CO2 emissions produced worldwide.

“This is the first time we are participating in the Escazú COP since we joined as a full member,” Chilean Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Gloria de la Fuente, who heads the Chilean delegation, said before leaving Santiago.

“It is an important milestone since Chile was the country that originally proposed this process, which we later co-chaired together with Costa Rica,” she added.

“Escazú is an agreement to promote the rights of access to information, participation, and justice in environmental matters. It is an opportunity to collaborate with other countries in the region and promote a sustainable future in Latin America and the Caribbean,” she went on.