Glasgow climate summit at risk of failure, U.N. chief warns

Glasgow climate summit at risk of failure, U.N. chief warns
# 17 September 2021 04:37 (UTC +04:00)

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres said a critical meeting on climate change later this year in Scotland is at risk of failure due to mistrust between developed and developing countries and a lack of ambitious goals among some emerging economies, APA reports quoting Reuters.

The U.N. COP26 conference in Glasgow aims to wring much more ambitious climate action and the money to go with it from participants around the globe. Scientists said last month that global warming is dangerously close to spiralling out of control.

"I believe that we are at risk of not having a success in COP26," Guterres told Reuters in an interview at U.N. headquarters in New York on Wednesday. "There is still a level of mistrust, between north and south, developed and developing countries, that needs to be overcome."

"We are on the verge of the abyss and when you are on the verge of the abyss, you need to be very careful about what the next step is. And the next step is COP26 in Glasgow," he said.

Guterres and Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson will on Monday host a meeting of world leaders on the sidelines of the annual high-level week of the U.N. General Assembly in a bid to build the chances of success at the climate conference, being held from Oct. 31 to Nov. 12.

"My objective and the reason why we are convening a meeting on Monday is exactly to build trust, to allow for everybody to understand that we all need to do more," Guterres said.

"We need the developed countries to do more, namely in relation to the support to developing countries. And we need some emerging economies to go an extra mile and be more ambitious in the reduction of air emissions," he said.

Monday's meeting, which will be both virtual and in-person, will be closed to allow for "frank and open discussions" on how to deliver success in Glasgow, said a senior U.N. official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

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