COP28: UAE planned to use climate talks to make oil deals

[Eugene]

Source: BBC

COP28: UAE planned to use climate talks to make oil deals

27 November 2023

By Justin Rowlatt
Climate editor, BBC News

The United Arab Emirates planned to use its role as the host of UN climate talks as an opportunity to strike oil and gas deals, the BBC has learned.

Leaked briefing documents reveal plans to discuss fossil fuel deals with 15 nations.

The UN body responsible for the COP28 summit told the BBC hosts were expected to act without bias or self-interest.

-snip-

The documents - obtained by independent journalists at the Centre for Climate Reporting working alongside the BBC - were prepared by the UAE's COP28 team for meetings with at least 27 foreign governments ahead of the COP28 summit, which starts on 30 November.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-67508331

[Think. Again.]

1. Well, there it is.

It has been long argued that allowing COP28 to be presided over by the UAE and oil industry executives is suspect at best and in violation of terms at worst.

In my opinion, the UN should immediately cancel this hi-jacked conference and reschedule it strictly according to the standards set by the UN body responsible for the climate negotiations, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

[hatrack]

2. Of course they did - and they will . . . .

Did anyone think that hundreds of oil industry lobbyists and executives attended these things so they could meet Greta Thunberg?

[hatrack]

3. From the same BBC coverage

EDIT

Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, the head of the COP20 summit in Peru in 2014, worries a collapse in trust could mean no progress on tackling climate change in Dubai. "The president of the COP is the leader of the world, is trying to build consensus on behalf of the planet," he told the BBC. "If any president of the COP tries to bring a particular interest, [including] commercial interest, that could mean the failure of the COP."

Prof Michael Jacobs of Sheffield University, who is an expert on UN climate politics, told the BBC the COP28 team's actions looked "breathtakingly hypocritical". "I actually think it's worse than that," he said, "because the UAE at the moment is the custodian of a United Nations process aimed at reducing global emissions. And yet, in the very same meetings where it's apparently trying to pursue that goal, it's actually trying to do side deals which will increase global emissions."

EDIT

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-67508331