Ibrahim first met Adeela, his betrothed, shortly before the wedding. He found her pleasant in appearance and a lively and discerning personality with good practical sense, though only a rudimentary education. He was happy with his parent’s choice. The marriage negotiations culminated in a wedding ceremony in January 2007, followed by a two-day celebration in the traditional Maldivian manner.
Ibrahim vowed to extend Adeela’s education and expand her personal horizons, but life’s other demands quickly intervened. Within a year, Adeela was busy with the arduous chores of recovering from her first pregnancy, managing the household, and rearing their child.
The child was a girl, which satisfied Ibrahim but left his parents and older relatives disappointed. He assured them that the girl was just the first of several children, which would eventually include a boy. When the second child was also a girl, their parents’ concern increased. Adeela knew that to Ibrahim the girls were just as enjoyable and valuable as boys, but she felt the stress of disappointing their families.
In the Foreign Ministry, Ibrahim was a star almost from the first day. His deep knowledge of English, his Indian and British training in philosophy and government, his broad knowledge of the perspectives and problems of Europe, and his pleasant, noncombative, but persistent personality put him in a class by himself compared to his contemporaries.
Overseas as well, his British education, elocution, and sophisticated taste in clothes and manners gained him easy acceptance in diplomatic circles. After the standard three-year tours in the Maldivian embassies in Delhi and Sri Lanka, he began serving as his country’s Delegate to various UN specialized agency conferences. In these forums, the plight of the Maldives could be argued to a larger audience of diplomats from states that were similarly threatened, though not so immediately and drastically, as well as to others less aware of the threat of global warming.
The more he learned about climate change, the deeper his anger and frustration grew. Most of the delegates to these conferences are either inexperienced or mediocre. They have no real influence at home, and many are simply enjoying the good life, traveling to beautiful conference venues, staying in four- and five-star hotels, and eating well. They return home with interesting gossip for their home office managers and colleagues. They have no sense of mission or urgency, and little ability to change policy even if they did.
There were no AOSIS Conference sessions on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, and Ibrahim had no specific plans or obligations. Many delegates spent the weekend enjoying Phuket’s beaches, restaurants, and other pleasures. In between, they used some of their time to draft reports on the meeting activities for the edification of their prime ministers and foreign ministries.
As Ibrahim ate breakfast in his room, he took out his tablet and began struggling to bring an inchoate fantasy to life: designing a strategy to initiate an SRM project— a veil that could give some immediate relief from climate change and save at least some of his people from disaster.
As the scheme unfolded in his mind and took shape in black-and-white on his tablet, his mood alternated between exhilaration and despair. One moment he saw his “plan” as creative, bold, and plausible, the next moment as an armchair fantasy, a science fiction dream that would never survive a conversation with the first person he approached for support.
With the rough outline of his scheme in hand, Ibrahim began scouring the list of AOSIS delegates in search of a few trustworthy allies. He found two who might see the necessity and have the courage to proceed in an unorthodox way. The first was Ambassador Kamla Panday, currently UN Ambassador for Trinidad & Tobago, two low-lying islands at the southern tip of the Caribbean archipelago.
Aside from its undeniable exposure to sea level rise, Tobago had been completely flattened by a hurricane in 2019. Tobago residents were evacuated to Trinidad, which fortunately did not suffer the same level of damage. Without that possibility, thousands of lives might have been lost. As it was, the property damage was enormous. It would require years of investment just to restore the infrastructure and moderate quality of life that had existed for the previous decade.
Panday was a senior diplomat and the son of a diplomat, far more experienced than Ibrahim. He had benefitted from education at Yale University and served in his state’s diplomatic corps all his life. His family’s origins were a mixture of African slaves and South Asian “indentured servants” imported to replace African slaves who rebelled against the backbreaking work on the sugar plantations. His American education had shaped his personality and approach to problems toward practicality and openness, unlike the more formal diplomatic style of most ambassadors.
Still healthy and clearheaded, Panday had nevertheless reached the point where he was comfortable with his present status. He had little expectation of a more demanding or visible leadership role either at home or abroad. His most immediate concern was finding an appropriate husband for his youngest daughter, Nora. He had married children and several grandchildren, but Nora was his favorite. He was determined to ensure a secure future for her.
Ambassador Anarood Doyal of Mauritius was the other possibility. He was also a seasoned diplomat, older than Ibrahim but still young enough to have ambitions and correspondingly, more cautious. Fluent in English, French, and Bhojpuri—all widely spoken in Mauritius—he had earned a first-class diplomat’s education at the University of Tokyo, including Japanese and a solid grounding in Asian political history. He pursued a year of postgraduate studies at Tsinghua University in Beijing, learning Chinese and getting a feel for the tensions and disconnects in China’s rapidly evolving society. Then he worked for a few years in the Shanghai office of an American bank, evaluating investment opportunities for its clients and learning how the business world works.
When he applied for a diplomatic position in the Foreign Ministry of Mauritius, he was hired at once. A big man with dramatic facial expressions and a forceful personality to match, he rose quickly through the ranks of Mauritius’ small diplomatic corps, serving as its Delegate to the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), then as a senior staff member in the Mauritius UN Mission, and eventually as Ambassador to the United States. Now he was back in the world of international organizations as Ambassador of Mauritius to the United Nations and to AOSIS. He displayed great style and presence and an excellent sense of the dramatic. He loved the pomp and circumstance of diplomacy. He looked forward to being the center of attention wherever he went.
Doyal loved the challenge of threading the needle to gain consensus on issues large and small. His ambitions grew with his success. He had persuaded a coalition of island and East African states to nominate him for Director-General of UNESCO, and though this effort seemed likely to fail, other similar opportunities would arise. Meanwhile, if the local political winds blew in the right direction, he might become Deputy Foreign Minister, the highest ranking civil servant in the Mauritius Ministry.
Ibrahim hesitated even to approach either of them. Why would either one risk tarnishing his record to pursue this fool’s errand of a project dreamed up overnight by an inexperienced junior diplomat from another tiny island state? They both have little to gain, a lot to lose.
He knew Panday better than Doyal. Panday is a perceptive senior diplomat. He demonstrates a strong concern for future generations, and relatively less concern for his own advancement. Perhaps he would be willing to take a chance with my scheme because it is the right thing to do, despite doubts about its success and a powerful desire to avoid an embarrassing end to his illustrious career.
He would start with Panday. If Panday seemed interested, they could approach Doyal together. Trying to restrain his enthusiasm, Ibrahim slept on the idea overnight. He recognized he would be rolling the dice by talking to Panday. Even to propose his scheme to one of these “old hand” Ambassadors might create a perception of him as an unrealistic dreamer and damage his own career. But he was determined to embark on this perilous enterprise.
Chapter 5
Phuket
Ibrahim gathered his courage and called Ambassador Panday. “Are you free for lunch?”