SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt, Nov 7 (Reuters) – World leaders and diplomats framed the struggle in opposition to international warming as a battle for human survival throughout opening speeches on the COP27 climate summit in Egypt on Monday, with the pinnacle of the United Nations declaring an absence of progress thus far had the world rushing down a “highway to hell”.
The stark messages, echoed by the heads of African, European and Middle Eastern nations alike, set an pressing tone as governments started two weeks of talks within the seaside resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh to determine the best way to avert the worst of climate change.
“Humanity has a choice: cooperate or perish,” U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres told delegates, urging them to accelerate the transition from fossil fuels and speed funding to poorer countries struggling under climate impacts that have already occurred.
Despite decades of climate talks so far, countries have failed to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, and their pledges to do so in the future are insufficient to keep the climate from warming to a level scientists say will be catastrophic.
Land war in Europe, deteriorating diplomatic ties between top emitters the United States and China, rampant inflation, and tight energy supplies threaten to distract countries further away from combatting climate change, Guterres said, threatening to derail the transition to clean energy.
“Greenhouse gasoline emissions continue to grow. Global temperatures preserve rising. And our planet is quick approaching tipping factors that may make climate chaos irreversible,” he said. “We are on a freeway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator.”
Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, also speaking at the event, said global leaders have a credibility problem when it comes to climate change and criticized developed nations’ ongoing pursuit of gas resources in Africa, which he described as “fossil gas colonialism.”
“We have a credibility drawback all of us: We’re speaking and we’re beginning to act, however we’re not doing sufficient,” Gore stated.
French President Emmanuel Macron stated that, whereas the world was distracted by a confluence of world crises, it was necessary to not sacrifice nationwide commitments to struggle climate change.
“We is not going to sacrifice our commitments to the climate because of the Russian risk when it comes to vitality,” Macron said, “so all nations should proceed to uphold all their commitments.”
UAE TO CARRY ON PUMPING OIL, GAS
[1/7] United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Secretary-General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres, Jordan’s King Abdullah II, France’s President Emmanuel Macron, Bulgaria’s President Rumen Radev, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati, Crown Prince and the Prime Minister of Bahrain Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Hassan Shoukry, Saudi Adel Al-Jubeir and other leaders pose for a family photo during the COP27 climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt November 7, 2022. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem
While leaders tended to agree on the risks of global warming, their speeches revealed huge rifts, including over whether fossil fuels could play a role in a climate-friendly future, and who should pay for climate damage that has already occurred.
Immediately after Guterres’ speech urging an end to the fossil fuel era, United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahya took the stage and said his country, a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, would continue to produce them for as long as there is a need.
“The UAE is taken into account a accountable provider of vitality, and it’ll proceed taking part in this function as lengthy as the world is in want of oil and gasoline,” he stated.
The UAE will host subsequent yr’s U.N. convention, which can try and finalise agreements made final yr in Britain and at this yr’s Egyptian talks.
Many countries with rich resources of oil, gas, and coal have criticized the push for a rapid transition away from fossil fuels, arguing it is economically reckless and unfair to poorer and less developed nations keen for economic growth.
“We are for a inexperienced transition that’s equitable and simply, as a substitute of selections that jeopardise our improvement,” stated Macky Sall, president of Senegal and chair of the African Union.
Poorer nations that bear little duty for historic carbon emissions have additionally been arguing they need to be compensated by wealthy nations for losses from climate-fueled disasters together with floods, storms and wildfires.
Signatories to the 2015 Paris Agreement had pledged to attain a long-term purpose of protecting international temperatures from rising by greater than 1.5°C above pre-industrial ranges, the brink past which scientists say climate change dangers spinning uncontrolled.
Guterres stated that purpose was attainable provided that the world can obtain net-zero emissions by 2050. He requested nations to comply with part out the usage of coal, some of the carbon-intense fuels, by 2040 globally, with members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development hitting that mark by 2030.
The head of the International Monetary Fund advised Reuters on the sidelines of the convention that climate targets rely on attaining a worldwide carbon worth of no less than $75 a ton by the tip of the last decade, and that the tempo of change in the true economic system was nonetheless “way too slow”.
The World Trade Organization, in the meantime, stated in a report revealed on Monday that it ought to deal with commerce boundaries for low carbon industries to deal with the function of world commerce in driving climate change.
Reporting by William James, Valerie Volcovici and Simon Jessop; Editing by Richard Valdmanis, Katy Daigle, Barbara Lewis, Frank Jack Daniel and Deepa Babington
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