Tuvalu PM Calls for Climate Compensation for Vulnerable Island Nations

Prime Minister Feleti Teo of Tuvalu, a Pacific island nation threatened by submersion due to climate change-induced sea level rise, said in an exclusive interview on June 5 that the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) July 2025 advisory opinion affirming every nation’s obligation to address climate change was “a milestone achievement,” Kosuke Hatta reported for Mainichi Japan.

Island states like Tuvalu have minimal greenhouse gas emissions but are extreme vulnerability to climate change.

Teo stressed that island states with minimal greenhouse gas emissions but extreme vulnerability to climate change “need to be compensated for damages that we suffered.”

Teo visited Japan to attend the Island States Ocean Summit held in Tokyo from June 3 to 4.

The ICJ opinion described climate change as an “existential problem of planetary proportions that imperils all forms of life” and stated that nations failing to take meaningful action could bear legal responsibility.

The United Nations General Assembly, composed of 193 member states, also adopted a resolution in May 2026 supporting the opinion by a large majority.

Teo said the conversation had shifted “from moral obligations to a legal commitment.”

He argued that countries responsible for causing climate change must provide aid or “be held accountable for their actions in causing climate change.”

While neither the ICJ opinion nor the U.N. resolution is legally binding, Teo said they could “hopefully be the basis of a future treaty” establishing binding international measures.