Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar has stressed the need for operationalising the ‘Loss and Damage Fund’ for vulnerable countries that have been hit hard by climate disasters, ensuring its utilisation on merit to cope with the issues of climate change.

In an interview with CNN, he said the utilisation of the fund should not be linked with the development funds and loans from multilateral financial entities but the funding should be additional and tangible.

Kakar is in Dubai to attend the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP28.

Pakistan’s focus was on transformation from coal-based power plants to renewable energy projects to contribute towards minimising the climate change impacts in the region and beyond, he added.

“This is the area that could attract the interest of countries here in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the settled economies and democracies on the Western side, so it is an opportunity for all of them and all of us,” he added.

According to Kakar, climate change was no more a “fashionable point” to discuss as it hit Pakistan very hard last year.

The prime minister pointed out that Pakistan was not primarily responsible for contributing to the climate disaster in which the country’s two provinces Sindh and Balochistan faced historical devastation.

“Everyone knows who has been contributing in the last century so it is more of a question of an honest conversation rather than passing judgment on countries and economies,” he said. Therefore, he said, the responsibility shown by the wealthy nations themselves would be a welcome step.

To a question whether the fund should be operationalized through a United Nations framework, the prime minister said: “If we wait for a UN framework it will take years of years. Therefore, initially, it is possible to operationalize it under the World Bank and other multilateral entities.”