Denial, division & diversion

As the 30th edition of UN climate summit, COP30, delivered as projected at the beginning of the summit?

- Avilash Roul

Certainly, the trust in the Paris Agreement has been maintained and partially achieved.Faith in multilateralism has been sustained despite the absence of the second-largest emitter of Greenhouse Gases (GHG), the US. However, the division among the coalition member groups within COP is as stark as ever in 30 years of climate negotiations. But then again, there is neither a financial commitment from developed member countries nor a roadmap for phasing out of fossil fuels, culprits of climate change. As a result, 194 parties (minus the US) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) have collectively left the planet under increasing temperatures by slowing down climate actions.

Continuing the faith in the multilateral climate cooperation and maintaining the stature of Brazilian leadership, the outcome of the climate summit is a mixed one, with high disappointment but low ambitions. One can easily find out that the climate change mitigation, enshrined as the main objective of the UNFCCC in Article 2, has gradually and deliberately been put on the back burner. Stabil-