Landmark Paris Agreement ‘more fragile’ than ever, UK’s top climate diplomat warns
The world’s landmark Paris Agreement is “more fragile” than it has ever been and disagreements risk “imploding” it, the UK’s climate ambassador has warned.
The seminal treaty obliges countries to produce regular plans on how they will cut greenhouse gas emissions in order to slow climate change.
Since it was signed in 2015, predicted levels of global warming have fallen, the cost of wind and solar have plummeted and net zero targets have proliferated.
But the Paris Agreement is “more fragile now than it has been in the nine years up to now”, the UK’s new climate envoy Rachel Kyte said yesterday evening.
She added: “Certain countries push back on Paris because it’s too effective, in some respects. And then you’ve got countries who are saying it’s not effective enough.”
“It would be bizarre, if those two [things] came together and Paris found itself with not enough friends”, she said at an event hosted by the Overseas Development Institute thinktank.
Then UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon and French President Francois Hollande among those celebrating the Paris Agreement at COP21 in Paris in 2015. Pic: Reuters
This week vulnerable island countries like Vanuatu, frustrated by glacial climate action, have taken their case to the International Criminal Court in a bid to hold polluting countries more accountable under the Paris Agreement.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, other countries think the treaty allows for too much meddling in their own affairs, said Ms Kyte.
They perceive the Paris Agreement as “beginning to lean into their kitchen and start looking over their shoulders while they’re making the soup”.
Ms Kyte – who took up the new role of top UK climate diplomat in September – did not name any countries.
But some Gulf States and India have hit back at accusations their national climate plans aren’t ambitious enough.
“So this is at risk of imploding the agreement... if you put the two together, Paris itself is quite fragile,” she said.
Her warning comes after a difficult time for global climate efforts, including the annual COP summits that produced and make progress on the Paris Agreement.
Last month, a group of climate heavyweights warned COPs were “no longer fit for purpose” and should be reformed.
Donald Trump is expected to pull the US out of the Paris Agreement when he takes office next month. His re-election has already had a “softening” effect on climate ambition in other countries, Ms Kyte said.
“I think it is important to recognise that Paris is working. [But] it is not working well enough.”
She said it’s “not that there’s some kind of fundamental flaw in the Paris Agreement”, but that every country needs to step up and “deliver the ambition” in it by producing more ambitious climate plans, which are due next year.
Under Paris, countries agreed to limit warming to no more than 2C, and ideally 1.5C, above levels before industrial times.
But current plans limit warming only to around 3C, the United Nations warned recently.
While this could still be catastrophic, it is better than the 4C the world was on course for before the Paris Agreement was struck.
Last month countries at the COP29 climate talks in Azerbaijan, agreed to channel $300bn a year to developing states to help them tackle climate change.
The figure is far short of the $1.3trn needed, fuelling concerns countries won’t be able to afford to come up with ambitious enough plans next year.
World
Ukraine war: 14 killed as Russian missile and drone attacks strike Kyiv – including American citizen
Russian missile and drone attacks have killed 14 people in Kyiv overnight, according to Ukrainian officials.
A 62-year-old US citizen who suffered shrapnel wounds is among the dead.
At least 99 others were wounded in strikes that hollowed out a residential building and destroyed dozens of apartments.
Pic: AP
Emergency workers were at the scene to rescue people from under the rubble.
Images show a firefighter was among those hurt, with injured residents evacuated from their homes.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the attack as “one of the most terrifying attacks on Kyiv” – and said Russian forces had fired 440 drones and 32 missiles as civilians slept in their homes.
“[Putin] wants the war to go on,” he said. “It is troubling when the powerful of this world turn a blind eye to it.”
Pic: AP
Ukraine’s interior minister, Ihor Klymenko, said 27 locations across the capital have been hit – including educational institutions and critical infrastructure.
He claimed the attack, in the early hours of Tuesday morning, was one of the largest on the capital since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022.
Drones swarmed over the city, with an air raid alert remaining in force for seven hours.
One person was killed and 17 others injured as a result of separate Russian drone strikes in the port city of Odesa.
Pic: Reuters
It comes as the G7 summit in Canada continues, which Ukraine’s leader is expected to attend.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy was due to hold talks with Donald Trump – but the president has announced he is unexpectedly returning to Washington because of tensions in the Middle East.
Ukraine’s foreign minister says Moscow’s decision to attack Kyiv during the summit is a signal of disrespect to the US.
Moscow has launched a record number of drones and missiles in recent weeks, and says the attacks are in retaliation for a Ukrainian operation that targeted warplanes in airbases deep within Russian territory.
Kyiv’s mayor Vitali Klitschko says fires broke out in two of the city’s districts as a result of debris from drones shot down by the nation’s air defences.
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Pic: AP
On X, Ukraine’s foreign ministry wrote: “Russia’s campaign of terror against civilians continues. Its war against Ukraine escalates with increased brutality.
“The only way to stop Russia is tighter pressure – through sanctions, more defence support for Ukraine, and limiting Russia’s ability to keep sowing war.”
Olena Lapyshnak, who lived in one of the destroyed buildings, said: “It’s horrible, it’s scary, in one moment there is no life. I can only curse the Russians, that’s all I can say. They shouldn’t exist in this world.”
World
Israeli tank shelling kills 51 people waiting for aid in Khan Younis, Hamas-run health ministry says
Israeli tank shellfire has killed at least 51 Palestinians in Khan Younis, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
Hundreds of others have been injured, with “dozens of critical cases” arriving at a medical complex.
It is feared that the number of fatalities will rise.
Pic: Reuters
The strikes took place as people waited for United Nations and commercial aid trucks in the southern Gaza city.
Witnesses said that Israeli forces carried out an airstrike on a nearby home before opening fire toward the crowd.
“Emergency, intensive care, and operating rooms are experiencing severe overcrowding,” a statement said.
Officials say medical staff “are operating with limited supplies of life-saving medicines” – with the ministry renewing an “urgent appeal” to increase aid.
Pic: Reuters
Hours earlier, Donald Trump had joined other G7 leaders to call for a “de-escalation of hostilities in the Middle East, including a ceasefire in Gaza”.
The Israeli military is yet to comment on this incident.
On Monday, Gaza’s health ministry said at least 34 people were shot dead near food distribution centres.
This was the highest reported daily total since Israel and US-backed aid centres opened last month, with thousands of Palestinians moving through Israeli military-controlled areas to reach them.
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