2022年11月10日 VOA慢速英语：联合国讨论气候谈判中的损失和损害

 

The United Nations climate change meeting known as COP27 began Sunday in the vacation town of Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt.
被称为 COP27 的联合国气候变化会议于周日在埃及的度假小镇沙姆沙伊赫开始。
 
The meeting is the 27th held since the first U.N. climate agreement in 1992.
该会议是自 1992 年第一个联合国气候协定以来举行的第27次会议。
 
This year, delegates from nearly 200 countries started the meeting by discussing aid for poor nations suffering damage from weather events linked to changing climates.
今年，来自近 200 个国家的代表在会议开始时讨论了对遭受与气候变化有关的天气事件损害的贫困国家的援助。
 
For more than 10 years, wealthy nations have rejected official discussions of what is called loss and damage. The U.N uses the term to describe damage from weather events blamed on warming temperatures caused by human activity. The term also is used in the insurance industry to describe things that are or are not covered by insurance policies.
十多年来，富裕国家拒绝正式讨论所谓的损失和损害。联合国使用该术语来描述天气事件造成的损害，这些损害归咎于人类活动引起的气温升高。该术语还用于保险业，用于描述保险单涵盖或不涵盖的事物。
 
United Nations officials said they are looking for "something meaningful in loss and damage." They added they were hopeful that the issue would be discussed in the meetings.
联合国官员表示，他们正在寻找“对损失和损害有意义的东西”。他们补充说，他们希望在会议上讨论这个问题。
 
Financial aid
经济资助
 
Money for loss and damage would be in addition to two other financial aid systems already proposed to help poor nations. Those systems aim to reduce the amount of heat-trapping gasses poor nations produce.
损失和损害赔偿金将是已经提议帮助贫穷国家的另外两个财政援助系统的补充。这些系统旨在减少贫穷国家产生的吸热气体的数量。
 
Since 2009, the rich nations of the world have promised to spend about $100 billion in climate aid for poor nations. Most of that money is meant to limit the expansion of the coal, oil, and natural gas industries and replace them with what are called "green" energy systems. Officials now want as much as half of the promised aid to go to dealing with future weather disasters blamed on changes in the many climates that exist around the world.
自 2009 年以来，世界上的富裕国家已承诺为贫困国家提供约 1000 亿美元的气候援助。大部分资金用于限制煤炭、石油和天然气行业的扩张，并用所谓的“绿色”能源系统取而代之。官员们现在希望将承诺援助的一半用于应对未来的天气灾害，这些灾害归咎于世界各地存在的许多气候变化。
 
Neither form of financial support has been carried out yet. But both are separate from the idea of paying for current and past weather disasters, such as high temperatures in India, floods in Pakistan, and droughts in Africa.
这两种形式的财政支持都尚未进行。但两者都与为当前和过去的天气灾害（例如印度的高温、巴基斯坦的洪水和非洲的干旱）买单的想法是分开的。
 
Also, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, some European leaders, and U.S. President Joe Biden have called for a tax on oil companies. The leaders want the energy companies to pay a windfall profits tax on gains earned while oil prices are high.
此外，联合国秘书长安东尼奥·古特雷斯、一些欧洲领导人和美国总统乔·拜登都呼吁对石油公司征税。领导人希望能源公司对在油价高企时获得的收益缴纳暴利税。
 
Leaders in many countries say they want some of that money in addition to aid from rich nations. They say the leading industrial nations created much of the heat-trapping gases that are blamed for changing climates around the world.
许多国家的领导人表示，除了来自富裕国家的援助外，他们还想要其中的一些钱。他们说，主要的工业国家制造了许多吸热气体，这些气体被指责为世界各地气候变化的罪魁祸首。
 
Losses and damages
损失和损害
 
Adelle Thomas of the Bahamas is a scientist with Climate Analytics, a non-profit group based in Berlin. Thomas said, "Our current levels of global warming at 1.1 degrees Celsius have already caused dangerous and widespread losses and damages to nature and to billions of people."
巴哈马的 Adelle Thomas 是位于柏林的非营利组织气候分析的科学家。托马斯说：“我们目前1.1 摄氏度的全球变暖水平已经对自然和数十亿人造成了危险和广泛的损失和破坏。”
 
She added, "Losses and damages are unavoidable and unequally distributed" among poor nations, the old, poor and weak.
她补充说，“损失和损害是不可避免的，而且分配不均”在贫穷国家、老旧、贫穷和弱国之间。
 
U.S. and European officials say they are willing to have loss and damage discussions after not wanting to for years. But the top U.S. climate diplomat, John Kerry, said the U.S. will not agree to anything that sounds like liability.
美国和欧洲官员表示，在多年不愿意之后，他们愿意就损失和损害进行讨论。但美国最高气候外交官约翰克里表示，美国不会同意任何听起来像是责任的事情。
 
Reparations
赔偿
 
Justin Mankin of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire said, "Loss and damage is a way of both recognizing past harm and compensating for that past harm." He added that, "These harms are scientifically identifiable…" He said it is now up to "the politics" to either defend that harm or pay for it.
新罕布什尔州达特茅斯学院的贾斯汀·曼金 (Justin Mankin) 说：“损失和损害是承认过去伤害和补偿过去伤害的一种方式。” 他补充说，“这些危害在科学上是可以识别的……”他说，现在取决于“政治”来捍卫这种危害或为此付出代价。
 
"In many ways we're talking about reparations," said University of Maryland environmental health and justice professor Sacoby Wilson. He said it is the right term to use because the rich northern countries gained from the use of fuels. Poor southern nations got the damage in floods, droughts, refugees and hunger.
“在很多方面，我们都在谈论赔偿，”马里兰大学环境健康与司法教授 Sacoby Wilson 说。他说这是一个正确的术语，因为北方富裕国家从使用燃料中获益。贫穷的南方国家遭受洪水、干旱、难民和饥饿的破坏。
 
The government of the island of Barbados has suggested changes in how development banks loan money to poor nations. It wants banks to consider the risk of damage from climate change and disasters. Pakistan and other nations have called for debt to be cancelled.
巴巴多斯岛政府建议改变开发银行向贫穷国家贷款的方式。它希望银行考虑气候变化和灾害造成的损害风险。巴基斯坦和其他国家呼吁取消债务。
 
Climate diplomat Avinash Persaud of Barbados suggests an unusual long-term tax on oil, coal, and natural gas sales. At current high energy prices, he proposes that there should be no tax. He said this would prevent inflation. But once fuel prices fall by 10 percent, one percent of the price drop would go to countries facing loss and damage from disasters blamed on climate change.
巴巴多斯的气候外交官 Avinash Persaud 建议对石油、煤炭和天然气销售征收不寻常的长期税。在目前的高能源价格下，他建议不应该征税。他说这将防止通货膨胀。但是，一旦燃料价格下降 10%，价格下降的 1% 将流向因气候变化而遭受灾害损失和损害的国家。
 
Climate change talks
气候变化会谈
 
U.N. Climate Secretary Simon Stiell told reporters Sunday that discussing loss and damage at the meetings shows progress.
联合国气候大臣西蒙斯蒂尔周日告诉记者，在会议上讨论损失和损害表明取得了进展。
 
He said, "This is a difficult subject area. It's been floating for thirty plus years." He added what will be most telling is how discussions progress over the next two weeks.
他说：“这是一个困难的学科领域。它已经漂浮了三十多年。” 他补充说，最能说明问题的是未来两周讨论的进展情况。
 
The U.N. climate conference on Egypt's Red Sea coast will last until November 18.
埃及红海沿岸的联合国气候大会将持续到 11 月 18 日。