24 April, Kathmandu:
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Kamal Thapa, signed on the Paris Agreement under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change during the historic High-Level Signature Ceremony convened by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on Friday.
The Ceremony was attended by 175 world leaders including the presidents of COP20, COP21 and COP22 (Peru, France and Morocco respectively), said a press statement issued by the Permanent Mission of Nepal to the UN, on Friday.
Addressing the opening ceremony, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged all countries to move quickly to join the Agreement at the national level so that it could enter into force as early as possible. He said, “Climate action is not a burden; indeed, it offers many benefits. The poor and most vulnerable must not suffer further from a problem they did not create.”
The Signature Ceremony was followed by two parallel sessions for national statements of the State Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), during which DPM Thapa delivered Nepal’s national statement.
While mentioning that as a mountainous country in which the lives and livelihoods of millions of people are directly affected by the climate change, the DPM called the Paris Agreement ‘a beacon of hope for safe and shared destiny of humanity’. He further said that the Agreement was a living instrument meant for serious implementation in coherence with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted in 2015.
“We have high hopes on our collective strength of global efforts, understanding, cooperation, partnership and support to combat the challenges and fulfill our ambition”, he concluded.
Later, DPM Thapa also co-chaired one of the sessions for national statements, together with the Deputy Prime Minister of Sweden.
The DPM also attended official luncheon hosted by the UN Secretary-General.
In the afternoon, DPM Thapa met with Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme, Helen Clark, who is also the Chair of the United Nations Development Group. During the meeting, the two sides exchanged views on Nepal’s economic development in the context of implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The DPM attended a dinner hosted in his honour by the Ambassador/Permanent Representative Durga Prasad Bhattarai in the evening.
