SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt
With the world on “a highway
to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator,″ the United Nations chief on
Monday told dozens of leaders to ”cooperate or perish,” singling out the two
biggest polluting countries, China and the United States.Ignazio Cassis, president of Switzerland, leaves after speaking at the COP27 U.N. Climate Summit, Monday, Nov. 7, 2022, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio
Guterres wasn’t alone in preaching with tones of fire and brimstone to try to
shake up the world’s sense of urgency at this year’s annual U.N. climate
conference.
“Choose life over death,”
former U.S. Vice President Al Gore urged. “It is not time for moral cowardice.”
Some of the strongest pleas
for action came
from leaders of poor nations that caused little of the pollution but
often get a larger share of the weather-related damage. Several called on
developed nations for reparations, which in climate negotiations is called
“loss and damage.”
“Africa should not pay for
crimes they have not committed,” Central African Republic President Faustin
Archange Touadera said, adding that rich nations were to blame for the climate
problem.
“Climate change is directly
threatening our people’s lives, health and future,” Kenyan President William K.
Ruto said of the African continent, which he said is looking at $50 billion a
year in climate change damage by 2050. Ruto said Kenya is choosing to not use
many of its “dirty energy” resources even though it could help the poor nation
financially, and has instead opted for cleaner fuels.
Loss and damage “is our daily
experience and the living nightmare of millions of Kenyans and hundreds of
millions of Africans,” Ruto said.
Seychelles President Wavel
John Charles Ramkalawan said, “Like other islands, our contribution in the
destruction of the planet is minimal. Yet we suffer the most.” He called on
wealthier countries to assist in repairing the damage.
Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley called for a massive overhaul of international development loans and a 10% tax on fossil fuel companies, which she said made “$200 billion in profits in the last three months.”
“I don’t need to repeat the
horror and the devastation wrecked upon this Earth over the course of the last
12 months since we met in Glasgow,” Mottley said. “Whether the apocalyptic
floods in Pakistan or the heat waves from Europe to China or indeed in the last
few days in my own region, the devastation caused in Belize by Tropical Storm
Lisa or the torrential floods a few days ago in St. Lucia.”
Ahead of this year’s
conference, known as COP27, leaders and experts have been ringing alarm bells
that time is running out to avert catastrophic rises in temperature. But the
warnings may not have the impact of past meetings because of multiple other challenges
pulling leaders’ attention — from midterm elections in the U.S. to the
Russia-Ukraine war.
“In the fight for life on
Earth, no one is a bystander,” said Jordan’s King Abdullah. “Every contribution
counts. COP27 has brought us together to link forces and stand our ground. We
are at the beginning of a long, challenging and urgent transformation.”
More than 100 world leaders
will speak over the next days at the gathering in Egypt, most from developing
countries demanding greater
accountability from the richest, most polluting nations. Much of their
focus will be on telling their stories of devastation by climate disasters,
including a speech Tuesday by Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif of Pakistan, where
summer floods caused
at least $40 billion in damage and displaced millions of people.
“Climate change will never
stop without our intervention,” the summit’s host, Egyptian President Abdel
Fattah el-Sissi, said.United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, listens to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, giving a speech during the COP27 U.N. Climate Summit
El-Sissi, who also called for
an end to the Russia-Ukraine war, was gentle compared to a fiery U.N. chief
Guterres, who said the world “is on a highway to climate hell with our foot on
the accelerator.”
He called for a new pact
between rich and poor countries to make deeper cuts in emissions with financial
help and phasing out coal by rich nations by 2030 and elsewhere by 2040. He
called on the United States and China — the two biggest economies — to work
together on climate, something they used to do until the last few years.
“Humanity has a choice:
cooperate or perish,” Guterres said. “It is either a Climate Solidarity Pact —
or a Collective Suicide Pact.”
But bad timing and world
events hang over the gathering.
Most of the leaders are
meeting Monday and Tuesday, just as the United States has a potentially
policy-shifting midterm
election. Then the leaders of the world’s 20 wealthiest nations will have
their powerful-only club confab in Bali in Indonesia days later.
Leaders of China and India —
both among the biggest emitters — appear to be skipping the climate talks,
although underlings are here negotiating. U.S. President Joe Biden is coming
days later than most other leaders on his way to Bali.
“There are big climate summits
and little climate summits and this was never expected to be a big one,” said
Climate Advisers CEO Nigel Purvis, a former U.S. negotiator.
United Kingdom Prime Minister
Rishi Sunak was initially going to skip the negotiations, but public pressure
and predecessor Boris Johnson’s plans to come changed
his mind. King Charles III, a longtime environment advocate, won’t
attend because
of his new role. And Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin, whose invasion of
Ukraine created energy chaos that reverberates in the world of climate
negotiations, won’t be here.
Many European leaders who
spoke Monday singled out Russia as the cause of the current energy and food
crises, saying the war in Ukraine showed shifting to renewable energy was a
matter of national security.
“We always want more” leaders,
United Nations climate chief Simon Stiell told a Sunday news conference. “But I
believe there is sufficient (leadership) right now for us to have a very productive
outcome.”
In addition to the leaders’
speeches, the negotiations include “innovative” roundtable discussions that “we
are confident, will generate some very powerful insights,” Stiell said.
Still, “the historical
polluters who caused climate change are not showing up,” said Mohammed Adow of
Power Shift Africa. “Africa is the least responsible, the most vulnerable to
the issue of climate change and it is a continent that is stepping up and
providing leadership.”
“The South is actually
stepping up,” Adow told The Associated Press. “The North that historically
caused the problem is failing.”
For the first time, developing
nations succeeded in getting onto the summit agenda the issue of “loss and
damage” — demands that emitting countries pay for damage caused by
climate-induced disasters.
Nigeria’s Environment Minister Mohammed Abdullahi called for wealthy nations to show “positive and affirmative” commitments to help countries hardest hit by climate change. “Our priority is to be aggressive when it comes to climate funding to mitigate the challenges of loss and damage,” he said.
Leaders of poorer nations,
joined by French President Emmanuel Macron, talked about the issue as one of
justice and fairness.
“Our part of the world has to
choose between life and death,” Tanzania President Samia Hassan said.
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