COP28: Emirati president calls for mentioning “the role of fossil fuels” in the final agreement

The 28th UN climate conference opened Thursday in Dubai with calls to include fossil fuels, responsible for global warming, in any final agreement, but to varying degrees by the Emirati president and the head of the UN Climate.

Sultan Al Jaber, president of COP28, asked delegates gathered at an opening ceremony not to omit “any subject” in the texts that will be negotiated over two weeks by delegates from nearly 200 countries. “We need to make sure we include the role of fossil fuels. I know there are strong opinions on the idea of ​​including formulas on fossil and renewable energy in the negotiated text,” said Sultan Al Jaber.

Minutes later, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Simon Stiell, went well beyond calling for a phase-out of fossils, following the recommendations of multiple UN reports. “If we do not give the signal of the terminal phase of the fossil era as we know it, we are preparing our own terminal decline,” he told all the delegates. “And the price paid will be in human lives.”