Mitsotakis raises climate change and migration at UN General Assembly

Greece will seek to make climate and migration central tenets of its work on the UN Security Council should its candidacy for the body for 2025/2026 be successful, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told the 78th UN General Assembly on Thursday.

“When we have lived through a summer like the one in 2023, the hottest on record, and when we talk rather than act on tackling the main drivers of irregular migration, or even the implementation of existing transnational agreements, we are in fact failing,” Mitsotakis said.

Summer floods, fires, heatwaves, and landslides have gripped the European South, North Africa and the Mediterranean, bringing unprecedented destruction to the region from Slovenia to Libya, from Italy to Greece, he continued.

In Evros, “the largest blaze ever recorded in the European Union burnt continuously for almost two weeks. In all 20 people were killed, hundreds lost homes and livelihoods, and an area greater in size than this city, New York, was raised to ashes. Seven hundred firefighters from across Europe fought valiantly to contain this devastating megafire, but they couldn’t tame it,” he told world leaders

“And as if that was not enough, ten days later Greece was struck by storm Daniel. The Thessaly region in the centre of the country saw twice as much rainfall in one day than falls in London in an entire year. It was the worst storm to hit Greece in over a century. Daniel carved its destructive path not only through my country, but through Libya too, landing upon the coastal city Derna, where the death toll now stands in the tens of thousands.”

These disasters have cost lives, destroyed businesses, upended communities, undermined social cohesion and severely compromised the fragile ecology of our most precious natural habitats, he continued.

Accepting that the climate crisis is not an alibi for everything, he noted that the science is clear: unprecedented temperatures, fuelled by global warming, are creating the conditions that drive these catastrophic events.

“This is no longer a crisis of the poorest, or of the Global South. Our own very unequal battle with nature is now being fought out across the European South, and the Mediterranean in particular.”

The new reality of climate change required a much more coordinated response.

Turning to the issue of migration, he said that Greece was “at the forefront of the global migration crisis.”

Greece would “always be an open and welcoming country for those fleeing persecution and violence, as well as those economic migrants who however seek a new future accessed via legal pathways.”

And while there were many job opportunities in Greece due to the growing economy and foreign investment, he said “we also need to fill those vacancies on our own terms, not those set by the criminal gangs,” referring to people trafficking networks.

“That is why it is critical that the international community works together to establish a far more comprehensive and coordinated approach. One that addresses the root causes of migration. One that more effectively counters human trafficking and migrant smuggling. And fosters legal pathways to mobility.”

Turning to relations with Turkey, Mitsotakis said he had told President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that he wants to look to the future.

The main difference between the two states was over the delimitation of maritime zones in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean “but it can be resolved in accordance with international law … We have made good progress over the past months in terms of normalizing our relationships and it is in our mutual interest to continue down that path.”

The Cyprus issue remained at its core, an issue of an illegal invasion and occupation, in violation of the fundamental principles of the United Nations Charter, the prime minister noted.

“Our commitment to Cyprus’ sovereignty, territorial integrity and the solution of one state based on a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation is steadfast.”