Strategic Panorama 2009 - 2010 - IEEE

Yolanda Castro Díez
hurricanes, tropical cyclones, droughts, snowfall and flooding are events
that strike the various regions of the planet indistinctly, and their devastating
effects evidence that mankind continues to be vulnerable to them.
According to the World Meteorological Organization, it is estimated that
natural disasters claim nearly 250,000 human lives every year and cause
between 50,000 and 100,000 million dollars worth of material damage. In
1991 alone the United Nations (UN) reported that over 90% of disaster
victims had been affected by disasters related to droughts, flooding and
whirlwinds. Flood damage is exacerbated by the presence of settlements
in areas prone to flooding such as natural watercourses in low-elevation
areas, and is more severe because water collects rapidly and in greater
volume as a result of the loss of plant cover owing to deforestation and
desertification. In contrast, long periods of scarce rainfall cause droughts
that affect the water supply of populations, harming agriculture, livestock
and other economic activities. According to the United States National
Climatic Data Centre (NCDC), which reports extreme weather events in
the country, the costliest losses in recent years have been due to droughts
and heat waves, amounting to more than a billion dollars between 1980
and 2003. The forecast increase in the occurrence of extreme weather
phenomena, based on the climate change projections resulting from the
General Circulation Models, envisage a huge demand for security measures
in response to emergency and disaster-management situations,
including evacuation.
Eco-terrorism
Climate change will be conducive to the development of eco-terrorism.
Eco-terrorists resort to open violence to defend nature. Their ultimate
motivation is to create a new type of environmental activism that is iconoclastic,
uncommitted, non-conformist to environmental policies and
fond of illegality. Unlike political terrorists, who generally aim to destroy
human lives, eco-terrorists have so far concentrated on causing damage
to property. According to the FBI, eco-terrorism is a serious threat which
caused 200 million dollars worth of damage between 2003 and 2008 (13,
14) and many US states have now introduced laws against eco-terrorism.
Another way in which these groups commonly act is to disseminate their
ideas through numerous websites that often launch demagogic messages
against the interests of industries or countries. The current situation of
climate change provides these groups with a motive for performing acts
of violence and sabotage against companies, energy installations, political
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