It is time to include climate change in the terrorism debate

An editorial in the National newspaper in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) addresses the role of climate change in fueling terrorist activities. "One of the most worrying aspects of climate change is its ubiquity. There is nothing that is not affected by global warming, from the economy and agriculture to migration and disease. The report, published this week, includes another issue where environmental damage exerts its harmful influence – terrorism,” it said. He reflects on Africa's Sahel region, where deaths related to extremist violence accounted for 43 % of the world's total deaths last year and where a new report calls global warming a "threat multiplier". The report continues: “Climate change is exacerbating economic and social problems. Heat waves and water shortages can threaten agriculture, which provides food and employment for millions of people. When this collapses, the salaries that terrorist groups in the Sahel offer their fighters may become an attractive proposition." The article concludes that now that climate change is "at the top of the global agenda" there is an opportunity to examine "how the damage , which it causes, can lead desperate people to the sirens of extremism".

Editorial, The National,