RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The negotiating process at COP26 ended in crisis in the first week, with optimism replaced by tensions and concerns that the process would fail.
In the first session on Monday, the crisis was exposed. On behalf of the 4 largest emerging economies, India made it clear that progress had been insufficient and that today the “credibility of the system is under threat.”
The emerging market governments want a framework to be put in place to assess the new threshold for contributions from wealthy countries. However, the Indians warn that developed countries have responded by proposing only vague, non-binding seminars. During the meeting, emerging economies made it clear that pledges to reduce CO2 emissions cannot be met without funding.
Last week, Brazil announced that it would reduce its emissions by 50% by 2030 and made similar proposals to China and other emerging economies.
In 2009, governments agreed to guarantee a US$100 billion transfer from wealthy to poor economies that would allow them to take action to reduce deforestation and adapt to climate change. However, in a proposal submitted last week, Brazil pointed out that this figure was never reached.
Major emerging economies now want Glasgow to initiate an institutional process to rethink the level of payments and for this work to be completed by 2023. But wealthy countries are refusing.
At the meeting, a reflection of the negotiating crisis, countries such as Bangladesh, Peru and many others cautioned about the risk of the process failing. “You talk about ambition, but you don’t even want to define climate finance or talk about losses for the poor,” criticized the Bolivian delegation. “How can you achieve real ambition? If we don’t learn from history, we will repeat it, and history consists of broken promises,” he said.
UNUSUAL ALLIANCE WITH CHINA
Despite distancing itself from China in international forums in the past two years, an unusual alliance with Beijing was forged at COP26. Senator Katia Abreu, part of the delegation, announced that she and Senator Rodrigo Pacheco met with China’s chief negotiator for COP26 Xie Zhenhua and listened to his tough position towards wealthy countries.
The informal alliance comes after the Bolsonaro government used meetings at the UN, WHO and other bodies to denounce China’s practices in international diplomacy. Now, Brasilia is liable to be closer to Beijing than to countries like the U.S.