Today, SIPRI and its partner, the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES), are launching a new series of videos and a report on environmental and climate justice and the dynamics of violence in Latin America.
Click here to watch the playlist.
Click here to download the report.
Environmental degradation aggravates inequality and violence
Latin America is a region of unparalleled ecological diversity, making it particularly susceptible to the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation. Of particular concern is the way climate challenges intersect with social inequalities and political instability. Latin America is also the region with the highest number of environmental conflicts and a hotspot for environmental crime. Many of these conflicts are linked to the extraction of natural resources, and because violence tends to disproportionately affect populations already at a disadvantage, it can perpetuate and amplify inequalities.
Environmental and climate justice and the dynamics of violence in Latin America
The report, available in English and Spanish, presents the collective perspective of the SIPRI–FES Latin American Regional Working Group, a group of 20 climate and environmental experts from 10 Latin American countries, on issues of climate and environmental justice and food security.
The working group identified key messages for a range of target audiences. What they all share is a call to regional organizations to assess and monitor the scale of violations and to penalize violators. They also call for the existing legal framework for environmental protection to be implemented.
The SIPRI–FES report is accompanied by four video interviews with working group members.
Watch the interviews with:
- Antonia Berríos Bloomfield, Environmental Lawyer and General Coordinator of FIMA;
- Ruth Alipaz Cuqui, General Coordinator of the National Coordinating Body for the Defence of Indigenous–Campesino Territories and Protected Areas in Bolivia;
- Carolina Hidalgo Herrera, Independent Consultant; and
- Pedro Landa, Honduran Representative of the International Platform Against Impunity.
About the SIPRI–FES regional dialogues
This report represents the third edition in a series of regional climate security dialogues. These dialogues have been organized by SIPRI in collaboration with the regional offices of the FES in order to explore ways of more effectively incorporating climate change-related risks into peace and security processes within conflict-prone regions and to establish a unified regional perspective and voice on the challenges at hand.