ABSTRACT
Climate change, "a large-scale, long-term shift in the planet's weather patterns or average temperature has significant implications for human, national, regional and international security. Climate change has direct security implications through its effect on the critical infrastructure underpinning a nation's security. On a broader and more diffuse level, climate change also presents a geostrategic threat by exacerbating stresses on the critical resources underpinning national security, including water, food and energy. Climate change may increase the fragility of states. Libya is a clear case of this nexus between existing state fragility, climate change and water insecurity. Another example of how climate change can increase the fragility of a state is Syria. Climate change-related weather events also have the capacity to disrupt global markets that are critical for the resource security of states. Climate change also places pressure on shared geostrategic, and often geographically ill-defined, environments, which may exacerbate existing international tensions, or create new ones.
