Climate conference in Egypt – Still no final paper at the world climate summit – News

  • At the World Climate Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, there are reports that an agreement is within reach.
  • Another official draft of a final declaration was presented to the negotiating teams.
  • However, a vote on this is still pending.

At the world climate conference in Egypt, the tough dispute over compensation payments for poor countries that are particularly suffering from the climate crisis was settled. A new financial pot is to be set up, as the German Press Agency learned from EU circles on Saturday. The payments are intended to help cushion the fatal consequences of global warming such as droughts, floods and hurricanes, but also rising sea levels and desertification.

Negotiations into the night


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Deep concern erupted in negotiating circles on Saturday night after delegations were only able to see draft texts submitted by the Egyptian Presidency on the status of the negotiations for just a few minutes. “It’s extremely unusual,” said a negotiator about the final sprint.

The delegations should not have taken the text with them, but only looked at it for 20 minutes and then commented briefly. In the passages dealing with the containment of global warming in particular, the text is “the opposite of what needs to happen,” reported a concerned delegate. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock referred to suggestions that were circulating that no state would have to increase its climate protection ambitions in the next ten years. “Then the 1.5 degree target would die here at this conference. And the European Union is not going along with that, »she emphasized.

The World Climate Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, should have ended on Friday. But because representatives of over 190 countries have not yet been able to agree on a joint final declaration, it is still in progress. However, the Presidency is working towards a result.

New draft wants to postpone controversial points until next year

A new draft of a final declaration was circulated in the afternoon. In order to be passed, however, this requires the consent of the almost 200 participating states. It is not yet clear whether this will succeed. Negotiators must first examine the text in detail.

The draft submitted provides for the clarification of many controversial points to be postponed until next year – above all the question of how the fund should be financed. A so-called transition committee is to develop recommendations that could then be adopted at the COP28 in November 2023.

Legend:

The entrance to the Sharm El-Sheikh International Convention Center grounds during the COP27 climate summit.

REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany

In the draft for the final paper, the states are also asked to improve their largely inadequate climate protection plans by the next climate conference at the latest, which will take place in the United Arab Emirates at the end of 2023. This remains voluntary, there is no obligation.

In the eleven-page paper by the Egyptian conference management, all countries are also calling for a gradual phase-out of coal. However, the demand by a number of states and climate activists to also bid farewell to oil and gas is not taken up.

EU wants ambitious formulations

However, a failure of the conference did not seem impossible over the course of Saturday. EU Climate Commissioner Frans Timmermans and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock warned that if necessary they would accept the two-week meeting being canceled. “We will not agree to any proposals that turn back the 1.5 degree target,” Baerbock clarified after fruitless nightly negotiations.

Timmermans also said that the association of states would not cross certain red lines. “It’s better to have no result than a bad one.” Ambitious formulations that promote the urgently needed containment of climate change are important to the EU.

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