COP29 opens in Baku with UN exec calling for halt to “rampant climate crisis”

(Baku, Azerbaijan) — This year’s United Nations climate talks COP29 began in earnest on Monday in the Azerbaijani capital Baku with UN Executive Secretary Simon Stiell urging negotiators to stop unbridled climate chaos.

The COP process is the “only place we have to address the rampant climate crisis, and to credibly hold each other to account to act on it,” he said at the COP29 opening ceremony in Baku stadium earlier today.

“And we know our process is working. Without it, humanity would be headed towards five degrees of global warming… This crisis is affecting every single individual in the world in one way or another,” he stressed.

Stiell admitted that no one single COP can deliver the complete transformation needed by every country but that the parties could at least “agree a way out of this mess.”

It is the second year in a row that the UN talks are being held in a petrostate and the third year in a row that they are being held in an authoritarian state.

Baku’s attachment to oil and gas is well-known — something which the autocratic Central Asian President Aliyev has called its “gift from God.”

Some see this oil-rich nation’s fossil fuel profile as an impediment to progress at the talks, others see it as a positive — a means by which rich oil and gas producing nations can be included in the world’s climate plans.

Stiell urged negotiators in Baku to agree a new global climate finance goal, and for widespread emissions cuts.

“If at least two thirds of the world’s nations cannot afford to cut emissions quickly, then every nation pays a brutal price,” he warned.

He also called for a change in the way climate finance is perceived by richer, more powerful nations.

“Let’s dispense with any idea that climate finance is charity. An ambitious new climate finance goal is entirely in the self-interest of every nation, including the largest and wealthiest,” he said.

Building on COP28

A historic roadmap was agreed at COP28 last year to transition away from fossil fuels.

The climate text agreed at COP28 called for a transition away from fossil fuels “in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner,” marking the first time that fossil fuels were acknowledged in a COP text.

It also called for the transition from fossil fuels to accelerate in this “critical decade” and gave 2050 as a net zero endpoint. But detractors said the language used in the final text was overly vague, not legally binding and enables loopholes.

Soft language, they reasoned, lets countries and companies off the hook too easily and short term targets were needed for transitioning away from fossil fuels. Others thought it marked progress nonetheless, which negotiations this year need to build upon.

Last year’s UN talks also saw a total of 50 oil and gas companies pledge to stop contributing to greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 in the Oil and Gas Decarbonisation Charter, though the voluntary commitment just covered emissions from production, not the actual burning of fossil fuels.

“In the past few years, we’ve taken some historic steps forward,” said Stiell. “We cannot leave Baku without a substantial outcome. Appreciating the importance of this moment, parties need to act accordingly,” he urged.

“Show determination and ingenuity here at COP29 – we need all parties to push for agreement right from the start — to stand and deliver.” 

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