Climate crisis – not China – is biggest threat to Pacific, say former leaders

Pacific elders say climate change is the primary threat to the region. Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty Images

Growing military tensions in the Pacific between China, the US and Australia do not address the most significant security threat to the region – climate change – former leaders of Pacific nations have warned.

In a statement on Friday, the Pacific Elders Voice group, which includes former leaders of the Marshall Islands, Palau, Kiribati and Tuvalu, as well as Dame Meg Taylor, the former secretary general of the Pacific Islands Forum secretariat, said that “the primary security threat to the Pacific is climate change”, rather than geo-strategic tensions.