As human-induced climate change threatens the human rights of people living in the Pacific, many seek opportunities to migrate to Aotearoa New Zealand. Sea level rise constitutes an existential threat for low-lying island countries projected to increasingly lose land to the encroaching ocean, such as Tuvalu and Kiribati. Coastal erosion, king tides, floods, extreme heat, droughts, and cyclones threaten Pacific Peoples’ rights to life, health, an adequate standard of living, and a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. In this report, Amnesty International documents how Aotearoa New Zealand’s immigration policy framework fails to reflect the needs of climate-affected Pacific Peoples. The international community’s failure to act on climate change, coupled with states’ increasingly restrictive approaches to international migration, subjects people displaced in the context of the climate crisis to a double injustice. Aotearoa New Zealand – and the international community – must act now to protect the rights and dignity of Pacific Peoples in the face of the climate crisis, both at home and in their country of destination.
