BAKU — Global action on climate change “is robust and will endure” despite the re-election of Donald Trump, who has pledged to withdraw from the Paris agreement, the UN’s climate chief said Tuesday.
“Many of you have been reporting on the climate implications of political events in the last weeks. I’ll just say this: our process is strong. It’s robust, and it will endure,” Simon Stiell told reporters at the COP29 talks in Baku.
Trump’s election sweep has cast a long shadow over proceedings in Azerbaijan, with concerns that the imminent US withdrawal from the landmark 2015 Paris deal could undermine ambition around the negotiating table.
Stiell reiterated calls for the meeting to show global solidarity on climate was not dead.
“Global cooperation is the only way humanity survives global warming,” he said.
The crunch talks are centred on increasing finance to help developing countries adapt to climate change and wean their economies off fossil fuel.
But the small group of rich countries currently paying the funds want to see the donor pool expanded, and are resisting calls for the current pledge of $100 billion a year to be raised ten-fold.
Many face domestic publics more concerned about inflation and sluggish economies than climate action.
Meanwhile, Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev, insisted that oil, gas and other natural resources are a “gift of the God.”
He said nations should not be judged by their natural resources and how they use them.
“Oil, gas, wind, sun, gold, silver, copper, all… are natural resources and countries should not be blamed for having them and should not be blamed for bringing these resources to the market, because the market needs them.”
“People need them.”
Azerbaijan has seven billion barrels of proven oil reserves and was one of the first places in the world to start commercial oil production.
