Nepal has done something important at the United Nations: it has tried to turn a natural disaster into a political argument about the unequal costs of climate change. Prime Minister Balendra Shah’s first address to the UN General Assembly came weeks after devastating floods swept through Nepal’s mountain communities. He put the scale of the catastrophe in stark terms ~ at least 1,400 confirmed deaths, more than 6,000 people missing and recovery needs estimated at roughly 10 per cent of Nepal’s GDP.

The United Nations has separately documented extensive destruction of homes, farmland, roads and other infrastructure in the affected districts. But the significance of Shah’s intervention lies less in the numbers than in the argument behind them. Nepal contributes less than 0.1 per cent of global greenhouse-gas emissions, yet climate disruption is threatening its glaciers, mountain slopes, rivers and development gains. For a poor country, every major disaster creates a cruel cycle: scarce resources that should finance development are diverted towards reconstruction.

That makes climate change not merely an environmental issue for Nepal. It is an economic and developmental trap. Shah was therefore right to connect climate resilience with........

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