NBC | IMO | “How Dare They!”, Malaysia accuses China, Canada, and the United States of harming the Arctic

October 15th, 2019 | In the “International Maritime Organization” (IMO) tensions reached a new high with accusations between China, Canada, the United States, and Malaysia circulating throughout the committee. The topic of the debate was concerning the maritime trade occurring in the Arctic circle currently. Many nations are finding it difficult to properly assess the Arctic resources without disrupting the environment and creating mass amounts of pollution. This is where Malaysia and China, as well as accompanying countries,  came head-to-head with their proposals.

China stated that the cap and trade program in place currently is not beneficial and has failed greatly to decrease the amount of pollution caused by ships going through the Arctic sea routes. China furthered this statement by saying the cap and trade program is a “complete infringement on the sovereignty of a nation” and that China is concerned with just “looking for a compromise”. China also stated that the cap and trade program has “no jurisdiction of enforcement” when it comes to holding certain countries responsible for polluting.

Malaysia stepped in once China spoke stating that China was one of the world’s leading polluters, therefore its claims of trying to help the Arctic environment mean nothing. Malaysia attacked China shouting, “How dare they!” Malaysia attacked China with other forms of slander and grew furious with every claim China spoke. Malaysia went as far as to attack Canada who agreed with China on forming a compromise. Malaysia said that countries such as Canada and the United States were harming indigenous populations in the Arctic.

Canada stated that it was not harming the indigenous people alongside the United States and said that Canada’s goal was to aid the native populations as much as possible and protect them from the chaos ensuing with potential harm to the Arctic from international trade.  Canada stated that “Malaysia is corrupt” and that its slander was nonsensical towards finding a solution for the debate. Canada brought up that it would like to see a demilitarization in the Arctic to allow more trade and further decrease international conflict.