Climate Change will Increase the Danger of War

By awarding the Nobel Peace Prize for 2007 to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and former US Vice President Al Gore Jr., the Norwegian Nobel Committee called special attention to their efforts to obtain and disseminate greater knowledge concerning man-made climate changes and the steps that need to be taken to counteract those changes.

The IPCC was established in 1988 by the UN General Assembly. The first four main reports submitted by the Climate Panel between 1990 and 2007 were based on a coordinated program of research by several thousand experts in over a hundred countries. The reports stated that climate change is accelerating, that the changes are to a significant extent man-made, and that the need to adopt counter-measures is urgent if we are to prevent a global climate crisis from arising in the near future and threatening the basis of human life.

According to the IPCC, there is a real danger that the climate changes may also increase the danger of war and conflict, because they will place already scarce natural resources, not least drinking water, under greater pressure and put large population groups to flight from drought, flooding, and other extreme weather conditions.