By Dana Niland
CJ Contributor

Costa Rica is joining forces with CARICOM to promote common interests in the fight against climate change.

New Costa Rican Ambassador to CARICOM, Lydia Peralte noted CARICOM-Costa Rica’s mutual climate change concerns and interests in a meeting with CARICOM Secretary General, Ambassador Irwin LaRocque in Guyana this week.

“On the road to the COP21, Costa Rica is committed to continuing the coordination and finding the common point we have with CARICOM, in particular the recognition of the equal parity that adaptation to climate change as well as Loss and Damage must have in the future Paris Agreement,” Peralta said.

COP 21, also known as the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, will be held in Paris from Nov. 30 to Dec. 11, and will seek to reach a collaborative legally binding agreement on climate-related principles.

LaRocque called for Costa Rica’s “continuing advocacy for the positions of our Small Island and Low-lying Coastal Developing States (SIDS),” and cited the recent devastations that have plagued The Bahamas, Dominica, St Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

He also welcomed a proposal from Costa Rica’s President, Luis Guillermo Solis Rivera, for a CARICOM-Costa Rica Summit in Limon, Costa Rica in 2017.