SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt – Several presidents and prime ministers spoke Monday at a global summit on climate change after the head of the United Nations opened the day’s session with a warning that the world “is in a highway to climate hell with our feet on the accelerator.”
The UN secretary-general, António Guterres, set the tone for the annual climate talks led by the United Nations, which officially began on Sunday as threats of war, warming and the economic crisis gathered. ravages every continent, hitting the world’s weakest. people are the hardest.
“We are in the fight of our lives, and we are losing,” Mr. Guterres said in opening remarks at the summit at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt. Several world leaders gave brief speeches at the event on Monday.
Later, the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak, told delegates that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine should prompt developed countries to invest more in renewable energy. “Putin’s ugly war in Ukraine, and the rise in energy prices around the world, is no reason to slow down climate change,” said Mr. Sunak. “It’s a factor that works faster.”
President Emmanuel Macron of France said that the war in Ukraine should not change the commitments of countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The talks opened under the shadow of disturbing new data: The World Meteorological Organization said on Sunday that the planet has probably witnessed the hottest eight years on record, including every year since the countries united. in 2015 to make the landmark Paris agreement aimed at pivoting the global economy away from fossil fuels and slowing global warming.
The biggest fault line in this year’s talks is the question of how rich, industrialized countries account for the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions that bear the brunt of climate risks. . In that there was little progress on Sunday – progress on the contentious issue of who will pay for the irreversible damage caused by climate change in the world’s most vulnerable.
Egypt is hosting the conference, and the government is trying to position itself as a climate champion in the developing world. But those efforts sometimes seem at odds with the country’s troubling records on the environment and human rights. Egypt’s most prominent dissident politician, Alaa Abd el-Fattah, who has spent more than 200 days on a hunger strike in an effort to force the authorities to release him, has vowed to start a water strike in summit start.
In addition, protests, which have been a feature of previous COP summits, have been noticeably absent in Egypt so far, partly due to strict security measures and the remoteness of the conference venue from major cities.
Even with most of the protesters off the streets, activists are still taking the opportunity to push governments to take stronger action against climate change. On Monday, environmental groups called for a “fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty” that would finally end all new oil, gas and coal projects.
The climate talks are the 27th session of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations convention, which is why the event is known as COP27. More than 44,000 people have registered to attend, including representatives of government, business and civil society groups.
The talks come at the end of a year that has seen unprecedented heat waves in the northern hemisphere, catastrophic flooding in Pakistan and Nigeria, and a punishing drought in China.
According to a list posted by the United Nations, 110 heads of state and government spoke at the conference, a larger number than at many previous climate conferences. Of these, only seven were women.
In her remarks on Monday, Prime Minister Mia Mottley of Barbados linked the inability of vulnerable countries to cope with climate risks to history, saying that the countries of the Global North still control the money needed by those countries in the Global South to move away from. fossil fuels.
He also reiterated the call for the overhaul of international development institutions such as the World Bank.
“This world is very much like it was when it was part of an imperialist empire,” he said.
