Nearly 200 nations on Saturday came together on a global deal to combat climate change after two weeks of painful negotiations, but fell short of what science says is needed to contain dangerous temperature rises.
Rich nations stood accused of failing at the COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, to deliver much-needed finance to vulnerable states at risk of drought, rising seas, fire and storms.
COP26 President Alok Sharma rounded up the negotiations, telling delegates: “It is now decision time, and the choices you are set to make are vitally important.”
Photo: AFP
However, China and India insisted that language on fossil fuels be weakened in the final summit decision text.
As the final deal was clinched, a tearful Sharma said: “I apologize for the way this process has unfolded. I am deeply sorry,” before banging down his gavel.
Delegates entered the talks charged with keeping the 2015 Paris Agreement goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C to 2°C within reach, and with finding the funding for nations most at risk of climate-related droughts, floods and storms supercharged by rising seas.
Observers said the agreement fell far short of what is needed to avert dangerous warming and help countries adapt or recoup damages from the disasters already unfurling globally.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres welcomed the deal, but said that it was “not enough.”
“We are still knocking on the door of climate catastrophe,” he said.
Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg said the talks had achieved nothing but “blah, blah, blah,” echoing earlier comments.
Laurence Tubiana, the architect of the Paris deal, said that “COP has failed to provide immediate assistance for people suffering now.”
Yet a statement from the European Commission said the deal had “kept the Paris targets alive.”
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose government hosted the talks, insisted the deal was a “big step forward,” even if much more work needed to be done.
The final text urged nations to accelerate efforts to “phase down” unfiltered coal and “phase out” inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.
Large emitters China and India had opposed the mention of the polluting fuels, and the language in the final text was significantly more nuanced than earlier drafts.
The deal also called on all countries to accelerate their emissions cuts by submitting new national plans by next year, three years earlier than agreed in Paris.
However, after resistance from rich nations led by the US and the EU, the text omitted any reference to a specific finance facility for the loss and damage climate change has already caused in the developing world. It instead only promised future “dialogue” on the subject.
“For some loss and damage may be the beginning of conversation and dialogue, but for us this is a matter of survival,” Maldives Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Technology Shauna Aminath said.
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