Prime Min­is­ter Dr. Ter­rance Drew says the Third Fo­rum on Hu­man Rights De­fend­ers in En­vi­ron­men­tal Mat­ters in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean which is be­ing held in an Eng­lish-speak­ing Caribbean coun­try rep­re­sents more than a meet­ing of minds, but rather, a meet­ing of pur­pose.

“It is a pow­er­ful sig­nal that the strug­gle for en­vi­ron­men­tal jus­tice and the de­fense of hu­man rights know no bor­ders, and that our small is­lands, with our proud his­to­ries and re­silient peo­ple, have a mean­ing­ful role to play on the glob­al stage,” he told the open­ing cer­e­mo­ny.

Prime Min­is­ter Drew told del­e­gates that en­vi­ron­men­tal degra­da­tion, cli­mate change, and bio­di­ver­si­ty loss are not ab­stract con­cepts but lived re­al­i­ties for com­mu­ni­ties in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean.

“Our com­mu­ni­ties are on the front lines. Our homes are vul­ner­a­ble, our ecosys­tems, once thriv­ing, now strug­gle un­der the weight of pol­lu­tion and ex­ploita­tion. And yet, amid these chal­lenges, there is hope.

“That hope lies in the courage and de­ter­mi­na­tion of our en­vi­ron­men­tal de­fend­ers. Those per­sons of­ten work­ing in si­lence and too of­ten at great per­son­al risk stand as the first line of de­fense be­tween our nat­ur­al world and those who would ex­ploit it for short-term gain,” he added.

He told the con­fer­ence of his coun­try’s own ex­pe­ri­ences and its Sus­tain­able Is­land State Agen­da, and reaf­firm­ing that the be­lief that en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion is in­sep­a­ra­ble from de­vel­op­ment. “

“The preser­va­tion of our rivers and reefs, the pro­tec­tion of our man­groves and ma­rine life, are not just en­vi­ron­men­tal ob­jec­tives. They are na­tion­al pri­or­i­ties and hu­man rights is­sues at their core.”

Prime Min­is­ter Drew said his coun­try is com­mit­ted to the Es­cazú Agree­ment, the first legal­ly bind­ing treaty to pro­tect en­vi­ron­men­tal de­fend­ers, em­pha­sis­ing its role as a bea­con of trans­paren­cy, in­clu­sion, and jus­tice.

The Es­cazú Agree­ment, of­fi­cial­ly the Re­gion­al Agree­ment on Ac­cess to In­for­ma­tion, Pub­lic Par­tic­i­pa­tion and Jus­tice in En­vi­ron­men­tal Mat­ters in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean, is a land­mark treaty guar­an­tee­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal rights, in­clud­ing ac­cess to in­for­ma­tion, pub­lic par­tic­i­pa­tion, and ac­cess to jus­tice in en­vi­ron­men­tal mat­ters, par­tic­u­lar­ly for vul­ner­a­ble groups and en­vi­ron­men­tal de­fend­ers

Prime Min­is­ter Drew said that con­fer­ence here is an im­por­tant step for­ward in the glob­al ef­fort to pro­tect those who de­fend our en­vi­ron­ment and de­fend hu­man rights.

The meet­ing, which ends on Fri­day, will dis­cuss a wide range of is­sues in­clud­ing the chal­lenges and risks faced by hu­man rights de­fend­ers in en­vi­ron­men­tal mat­ters: views, ex­pe­ri­ences and re­spons­es from Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean as well as In­ter­na­tion­al and na­tion­al in­stru­ments and mech­a­nisms re­lat­ed to pre­ven­tion, pro­tec­tion and pun­ish­ment.

BAS­SETERRE, St. Kitts, Apr 9, CMC