New UN warning on climate change

The latest UN report on climate change, to quote Greenpeace International campaigner Stephanie Tunmore, is a "glimpse into an apocalyptic future".
The report, second in the series of four to be released this year, made public in Brussels last Friday has warned of the climate change that is set to engulf every continent, with poor countries to be hit the hardest.
Reiterating an earlier UN warning that global warming is indisputably consequential to greenhouse gases, the report says early signs of global warming are already here. Spring is arriving earlier with plants blooming weeks ahead of the normal time. In the mountains run-off begins earlier in the year and that glaciers are shrinking in the Alps, the Himalayas and the Andes.
The latest report apprehends that up to 30 of animal and plant species will be vulnerable to extinction if the global temperatures gradually rise by 1.5-2.5 degrees Celsius (2.5 to 4.5 degrees of Fahrenheit).
The poor people are likely to be the worst hit by the impact of climate change, and they have no resources to respond to the mounting threat. It is, therefore, imperative that those responsible for the excessive release of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere be obliged take remedial action.
But that seems to be a far cry, given the news reports that the original findings for this second report were fiercely contested by United States, Saudi Arabia and China - so much so that the warnings as released to the media are much softer.
For instance, the assertion of the first report that global warming was the direct result of greenhouse gases is a "certainty" has been replaced by the word "likely". It will be, therefore, instructive to see what response UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon gets to his call for swift remedial measures.
But there is perhaps a silver lining to this dark cloud in the reaction of the European Commission, as the present report vindicates its agreement of last month on measures to bring down the gases emissions to pre-industrial levels.
Being essentially an agricultural economy sustained by glacier-fed rivers, Pakistan will be seriously affected by the changing snow-melt pattern in the Himalayas. Early arrival of summer too will also force an unforeseen cyclic crop sowing and reduce whatever little forests that remain in the north of the country.
Other South Asian countries, including India, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh too, would not be spared of the negative fallout of impending climate change. And, their deserts will enlarge forcing large scale migrations with concomitant economic, social and political problems.
This calls for raising pressure on the rich countries in the United Nations and at other world forums to cut gas emissions to avert what is being correctly billed the "looming humanitarian catastrophe".