Intelligence director says climate change is now 'at the center' of U.S. foreign policy

In order to tackle climate change, it has to be "at the center of a country's national security and foreign policy," Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told world leaders during a virtual global climate summit on Thursday.

Haines said the United States is taking this approach moving forward, adding that climate change "needs to be fully integrated with every aspect of our analysis in order to allow us not only to monitor the threat but also, critically, to ensure that policymakers understand the importance of climate change on seemingly unrelated policies."

On Thursday, the CIA said it is adding a new environmental category to its World Factbook, which will provide data on climate, pollution, infectious diseases, and food security for different countries. The intelligence community's most recent worldwide threat assessment said that the extreme weather caused by climate change will likely force people to leave areas as they become inhabitable, and this could lead to a possible surge in migration and instability. All of this would "exacerbate political instability and humanitarian crises," the report states.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up