Inside Geneva: pandemics and climate change, can multilateralism still work?

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The world just agreed a pandemic treaty. But without the United States. Is it really a milestone?

‘‘It is a major step forward. I mean, just imagine if we failed. We would not only go back to the point before the pandemic, before COVID-19 struck us, we'd go back to a point much further back,” said Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein from the International Peace Institute.

But what about the global challenge of climate change?

“We're up against a ticking clock. And even though we've enjoyed successes in the past, even though the renewables rollout is going rather well, it's all too little, too late from the point of view of avoiding genuinely dangerous degrees of warming,” says climate security expert Peter Schwartzstein.

Why can’t world leaders really unite around global challenges?

‘Their children and grandchildren have to deal with abominable and extreme heat levels and forest fires and fierce hurricanes and no trade and collapsed economies and extreme food security and complete anarchy. Is this what they wish for their children. What form of love is that?” continues al Hussein.

Join host Imogen Foulkes on Inside Geneva for in-depth analysis of where we stand.

 

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Host: Imogen Foulkes
Production assitant: Claire-Marie Germain
Distribution: Sara Pasino
Marketing: Xin Zhang