UN climate talks are not the same as developing countries start to withdraw | Weather News

Negotiators from small island and least developing countries have walked out of talks during the overtime United Nations climate talks, saying their climate finance interests were being ignored.

Emotions were high on Saturday as negotiators from rich and poor countries gathered in a room at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan to try to speed up a difficult financial agreement for developing countries to curb and adapt to climate change.

But the rough draft of the new proposal was resoundingly rejected, particularly by African and small island nations, according to internal communications.

“We just came out. We came here to this COP to make a fair deal. We feel that we have not heard,” said Cedric Schuster, the Samoan chairman of the Alliance of Small Island States, a coalition of nations threatened by rising seas.

“[The] the current agreement is not acceptable to us. We need to talk to other developing countries and decide what to do,” said Evans Njewa, chairman of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) group.

When asked if the walkout was a protest, Colombia’s Minister of Environment, Susana Mohamed, told the Associated Press: “I would call this dissatisfaction, [we are] who are not satisfied at all.”

As the situation escalated, climate activists again interrupted US climate envoy John Podesta as he left the meeting room.

They accuse the US of not paying its fair share and of the “legacy of burning the planet”.

Developing countries have blamed the rich for trying to get their way – and a small financial aid package – through the war. And the small island nations, which are most vulnerable to climate change, have accused the president of the host country of neglecting them in all negotiations.

Panamanian CEO Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez said enough is enough.

“With each passing minute, we will become more and more fragile. They don’t have that problem. They have big teams,” said Gomez.

“This is what they always do. They canceled us at the last minute. You know they push it and push it until the negotiators leave. Until we are tired, until we are deceived by not eating and not sleeping.”

Friday’s final official draft pledged $250bn a year by 2035, more than double the previous $100bn target set 15 years ago, but well short of the $1 trillion-plus a year experts say is needed.

Developing nations are seeking $1.3 trillion to help deal with droughts, floods, rising seas and extreme heat, pay for losses and damage caused by extreme weather, and transition their energy systems from planet-warming fossil fuels to clean energy.

Rich countries are responsible for paying for vulnerable countries under an agreement reached at the COP talks in Paris in 2015.

Mr. Nazanine Moshiri, a climate and environment analyst at the International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera that rich countries are constrained by economic conditions.

“Rich nations are being forced by tight domestic budgets, by the war in Gaza, by Ukraine and other conflicts, for example in Sudan, [other] economic issues,” he said.

“This is at odds with what developing countries are facing: the increased costs of hurricanes, floods and droughts, caused by climate change.”

Teresa Anderson, global climate justice lead at Action Aid, said that, in order to get a deal, “the president has to put something better on the table”.

“The US in particular, and rich countries, need to do a lot more to show that they are willing to get real money,” he told the AP. “And if they don’t, then the LDCs are less likely to find something to do for them.”

Despite the differences between the nations, some remain optimistic about the talks. “We are always optimistic,” said Nabeel Munir of Pakistan, who chairs the standing committee for negotiations.

Monterrey Gomez from Panama emphasized that there must be an agreement.

“If we don’t get an agreement, I think it will be a fatal wound to the system, to the world, to the people,” he said.