Tag Archives: Bonn

SB58

SB58 CLIMATE TALKS

Leave a comment

TWN Bonn Climate News Update No. 5

9 June 2023
Published by Third World Network

Parties provide reflections on outcome of the Global Stocktake

Bonn, 9 June (Meena Raman)- Parties had a rich exchange of views on the global stocktake (GST) during the first joint contact group convened on 7 June at the ongoing 58th session of the UNFCCC’s Subsidiary Bodies (SB58) in Bonn. They provided their reflections on what the GST decision should look like at the climate talks be held in Dubai end of the year, as well on the GST conclusions out of the SB 58 session.

Differences emerged over whether the GST outcome should assess gaps in the pre-2020 period, with the Like-Minded Developing Countries and BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) calling for inclusion of assessment of gaps in the pre-2020 period. This was however opposed by Canada. (The United States at the opening plenary of the GST had clearly said that the GST is an assessment of the collective progress in the implementation of the Paris Agreement (PA) goals and not the UNFCCC. (See TWN Update 3 ).

(At the current SB session, the technical assessment component of the first GST will conclude, with the convening of the third and last meeting of the technical dialogue, with the corresponding summary report to be published in July this year, and an overall synthesis of the summary reports to be published later in September.)

Cuba for the G77 and China said the GST outcome should be comprehensive and reflect all the thematic areas; it would be about looking backwards at implementation gaps and looking forward towards opportunities for addressing such gaps. The CMA (meeting of the Parties to the PA) decision should reflect an assessment on the progress and gaps in ambition and implementation of commitments and identify the opportunities, challenges and solutions for ambition and implementation in light of the principles and provisions of the Convention and the PA, said Cuba further.

Cuba also suggested that the joint contact group should agree on a top-level outline of the key elements of the CMA decision on the GST, which would then serve as the initial basis for further work to be undertaken intersessionally by the Parties in developing the outputs for the political consideration phase, including at the GT workshop in October and at COP28.

As part of preliminary areas in the outcome text, Cuba proposed a preamble; background/context/vision; crosscutting general assessment of collective progress; mitigation; adaptation; means of implementation; response measures; loss and damage; international cooperation; and way forward.

Cuba also suggested the Joint Contact Group should recommend to the SBs to “issue a joint call for submissions from Parties on the elements of the CMA decision, using the initial draft outline agreed at this session as the basis, and requesting Parties and non-Party stakeholders to provide their views and suggestions with respect to the substantive content based on the outline. The deadline for making submissions pursuant to this call could be in mid-August 2023 but after the publication of the factual synthesis report, with the Secretariat be requested to compile these submissions and make them available to Parties and non-Party stakeholders,” said Cuba.

Saudi Arabia for the Like-Minded Developing Countries (LMDC) highlighted the issues of pre-2020 to be at the forefront of the GST outcome. It said it is critical to respond to the mandate and ensure inclusive and comprehensive outcome. Saudi Arabia said that the LMDC sees the nature of the outcome as guided by common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR), equity, historical responsibilities and how climate action can better synergise with poverty eradication and sustainable development.

On the types of outputs, Saudi Arabia said the CMA decision needs to be the core component and that the declaration or the annex would not be useful. On the outline of the decision, it recommended keeping it simple by looking at mandates and said it supports a preamble and context and cross cutting consideration sections. It also suggested having sections on gaps in collective progress; mitigation; adaptation; loss and damage; response measures; and international cooperation.

Zambia for the Africa group said the decision’s outline should ensure comprehensive and balanced content and comprise all thematic issues in light of equity. It also said the GST must include the pre-2020 gaps and have forward looking elements to address the gaps. Zambia stressed the importance of leaving Bonn with an agreed broad outline of the decision in COP 28.

Algeria for the Arab group said it expects the outcome of SB58 to have a top-level outline of key elements to be addressed by the decision to be adopted in Dubai. It emphasized on the need for a submission process following SB58, which would give the possibility for Parties and non-Party stakeholders to present detailed views on the elements to be addressed by the COP 28 decision, “based on the outline we agreed in Bonn”. Algeria also said that any political declaration has to reflect the views of Parties and added that it was too early to decide on whether to have a technical annex or not.

South Africa for Brazil, South Africa, India, China (BASIC) said the decision should have comprehensive messages and include messages on pre-2020. It called for the same structure and comparable outcomes for all the themes and for these to be informed by equity and CBDR. BASIC said that any mandate to the co-chairs is premature. BASIC expressed concern that Parties were transitioning to the political phase of the GST without pre-2020 and biennial reports synthesized by Annex 1 Parties. South Africa also expressed concern on the lack of balanced treatment to finance, with a disproportionate focus on Article 2.1 (c) of the PA.

Brazil for Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay (ABU) made an impassioned plea for countries to act as the United Nations and said the global Stocktake should unleash unprecedented level of international cooperation so that the international enabling environment is in place for countries to present their most ambitious nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and close the gaps. Brazil also called on countries to work on the basis of empathy, solidarity and trust.

Senegal for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) said the GST must provide a comprehensive assessment and a pathway forward concerning adaptation, mitigation, including response measures, loss and damage, and means of implementation and support. It must offer clear guidance to countries on enhancing NDCs to keep the 1.5°C limit within reach. Additionally, it should promote actions, support, and enhanced international cooperation for climate action. It expressed concern on the way loss and damage continued to be considered only under adaptation, which undermined the “recognition given to loss and damage in the PA”. On the outcome, Senegal said that there should be a CMA decision with a technical annex, followed by a political declaration or a cover decision.

Trinidad and Tobago for the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) said the GST outcome should provide policy direction to course correct in areas where insufficient levels of ambition and needs of most vulnerable were not addressed. It said that the process and outcome must be both a backward looking as well as forward looking assessment of measures. The AOSIS said the outcome should include a political declaration, a CMA decision and a technical annex. It said the CMA decision should have a section on the way forward, which would invite Parties to explain how the GST has informed their NDC update once it is submitted in 2025 and that the decision must look at crosscutting issues including equity and best available science, progress and gaps, the role of non-Party stakeholders. It also said that it would like to see loss and damage treated separately from adaptation.

Colombia for the Alliance of Latin America and the Caribbean (AILAC) said the GST outcomes must be comprehensive and reflect equity and best available science and should provide a state of how “off-track” Parties are from the goal.

China stressed historical emissions of developed countries and pre-2020 gaps are important considerations for the GST. The GST should make substantive assessment and address gaps on adaptation and means of implementation and an ambitious outcome of the GST should focus on implementation and delivery of ambition, said China. “Empty numerical targets won’t get us anywhere,” said China, adding that the outcome of the GST should be a Party-driven, consensus based on the question of whether there should be a declaration or not, it said it is important to decide how to differentiate the content of the political declaration from the decision. It said an annex is beyond the mandate. The outline of the decision should reflect a balanced presentation of substantive assessment of progress and gaps and have sections on mitigation, adaptation, loss and damage, means of implementation and international cooperation, said China and added that there should be no reference to any sectoral approach. It also said within each thematic area, the structure should be comparable and identical and equity and science should be considered holistically instead of being segregated. It added that the formats, outline and the substantive elements are all interlinked and should be finalised as a packaged at COP 28.

The European Union said the conclusions from the SB 58 should have an introduction section, a section on technical dialogue, calls for submissions from Parties with a deadline of end of August. On the structure of the outcome at COP 28, it said they foresee a structure which includes sections on assessing collective progress toward long-term goals of the PA; high level response comprising political messages; opportunity for enhanced action and support along with new political commitments; thematic areas; guidance for NDC and long-term strategies, among others; and a final follow up section.

The United Kingdom said there must be a roadmap of actions across mitigation, adaptation and means of implementation, setting out “forward-looking commitments”, including in relevant sectors. It said it is open to considering how to reflect loss and damage and response measures in the decision.

Switzerland for the Environment Integrity Group (EIG) said that the elements of the conclusions from SB58 should include recognition of importance of GST for collective progress; confirm the closure of the technical dialogue process; call for submissions ahead of the October session and for the Secretariat to produce a synthesis of the submissions. Switzerland also said that the COP 28 outcome must include overarching reflections on progress and scale of challenge as well as be a transformational roadmap comprising information on ways of assessing gaps, ways of closing gaps. It suggested that issues of response measures and loss and damage could be included in a crosscutting chapter and there should be specific section in the decision on updating and enhancing NDCs and on international cooperation. It said the outcome should contain a chapter on way forward, comprising how Parties and non-Parties will implement the GST outcome, provide guidance to the UN Summit. Switzerland also requested the co-chairs to prepare an informal note capturing the discussions in the room.

Australia spoke to the structure of the outcome and said it should contain a preamble and have sections on assessment of progress corresponding to the global goals of the PA and under each of the sections, description of progress, gaps and commitments to close the gaps. It also suggested having a section on enhancing international cooperation as well as next steps.

The United States also spoke along the lines of the structure proposed by Australia. Canada said it does not support an assessment of pre-2020 implementation in the CMA decision.

Interventions, SB58

Intervention by Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice at Roundtable on Means of Implementation at TED 1.3

Leave a comment

Delivered by Meena Rama, Third World Network on behalf of ENGO – DCJ

There is a clear need for an honest assessment of the lack of adequate progress on the moi, without beating around the bush. We talk of raising ambition on climate actions, but we do not see the reciprocal ambition on the means of implementation for developing countries.

There is evidence to indicate the following:

  1. Developed countries have collectively failed in meeting their commitments on the provision and mobilisation of the financial resources that have been agreed to. This is borne out by –
    • The failure to mobilise the US$ 100 billion per year by 2020 and even up till now. While the numbers of what exactly has been mobilised and delivered vary in the SCF reports, the fact of failure to meet this commitment in a timely manner is loud and clear. This is a pre-2020 implementation gap which has been carried over to the pre-2025 timeframe.
    • This 100b goal is not based on the needs of developing countries but was a political number arrived at in Copenhagen, as we all know.
    • The SCF’s Needs Determination Report clearly indicates that what is needed at least in the pre-2030 timeframe is around $ 5-11 trillion, even with only 30% of the costs estimated in the NDCs of developing countries. Hence, the needs far outweigh what is currently available.
  2. Even the promise to deliver on the doubling of adaptation finance is far from what is needed, as seen from the various reports from various UN agencies.
  3. The Green Climate Fund and the Adaptation Fund are languishing for funds, as numerous projects in the pipelines are not able to be funded.
  4. Much of what has been provided including from the MDBs are mainly loans, with only a small portion being grants. With more and more developing countries in debt distress, loans are not the right instrument. There is clearly a greater need for non-debt creating instruments.
  5. Access to funds have not been easy to the limited funds available at the operating entities of the financial mechanism – the GCF and the GEF – with cumbersome procedures and slow disbursements. Intermediaries have largely been international entities as opposed to direct access entities from developing countries.
  6. The much hype about private finance and investment flows into developing countries. According to the SCF technical report on the 100b mobilisation report, the expectation for private finance mobilization has been severely an underperformance. The World Bank’s own ‘Scaling Solar’ project to try and leverage private finance for renewable energy projects only managed to leverage 28c private finance for every 1$ of public finance, and only with the support of generous guarantees, tax breaks and subsidies.
  7. Furthermore, access to low-cost finance is uneven as the cost of capital differs substantially between regions, with developing countries often paying an interest rate many times more to private creditors than other official creditors.[1]
  8. From recent IEA report on energy, the high cost of capital and rising borrowing costs threaten to undercut the economic attractiveness for investments in clean energy in developing countries, and that most of the positive trends in clean energy investments are leaving developing countries behind
  9. There are also studies which show that while international financial institutions (IFIs) have made progress, for example with increased climate financing and coordination from Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs), a Special Drawing Rights (SDR) allocation in 2021, and a new Resilient and Sustainability Trust (RST) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but IFIs have also been slow to release their financial firepower to meet the demonstrated need,[2] and continue to prioritise de-risking modalities which have little evidence of success. 
  10. There are genuine concerns over use of Article 2.1c as a way to impose new conditionalities for accessing finance in the name of enabling environments and to shift the burden and responsibility onto developing countries, contrary to article 9 of the PA. Should not make it difficult for developing c to access finance for meeting their NDC implementation.

Technology gap –

  1. In the area of climate technologies and their accessibility and transfer from developed to developing countries, progress has been insignificant and abysmal. This reality is clear. 
  2. There is indeed a technology gap which needs to be addressed for climate technologies to developing countries. There is evidence that there are intellectual property rights concerns where developed countries dominate in climate technologies patent ownership, production and trade.
  3. There are reports including from UNEP, UNCTAD and WIPO that show the dominance of developed countries in relation to low-carbon technological innovations. But these are missing in the assessment. Between 1990-2015, 80% of all low-carbon technological inventions were concentrated in developed countries. The fact that most patents for climate-relevant technologies are in developed countries has significant implications on technology transfer possibilities, as the design and use of such technologies may not be directly responsive to the needs of developing countries.
  4. These implementation gaps in finance and technologies will be further   exacerbated by developed countries’ carbon border measures and unilateral trade measures including non-tariff barriers that grossly disadvantage developing countries.  The implications of CBMs is missing in relation to the response measures.
  5. We are good in this process of setting up institutions but real delivery of the moi for delivering is not significant.

If the GST is to have meaning, it must address these gaps and challenges, not repeat the failures and mistakes and dramatically course correct. If there is political will, there will be a way. Need to see that will to realise the hopes and aspirations of esp. of the poor and the planet.

[1] Eurodad, 2021. Sleep now in the fire: Sovereign Bonds and the Covid-19 Debt Crisis. https://www.eurodad.org/sovereign_bonds_covid19;

[2] An Independent Review of Multilateral Development Banks’ Capital Adequacy Frameworks, 2022. Boosting MDBs’ investing capacity. https://g20.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/CAF-Review-Report.pdf

SB56

Roundup from Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice’s Activities and Events at Bonn Climate Change Conference SB56

Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) and its members took part in the Bonn Climate Change Conference for the 56th session of the subsidiary bodies, which took place from 6 to 16 June 2022, at the World Convention Center Bonn, Germany to prepare for the UN Climate Change Conference COP27 in November this year. This year the June sessions were focused on greenhouse gas emission reductions, adapting to climate impacts, and providing financial support for developing countries to cut emissions and adapt to climate change.

Scroll down for a roundup of DCJ’s activities in collaboration with its members during the 11 days of the Bonn Climate Change Conference.

False Solutions, Fossil Farces, and Fake Finance: What to Expect at Bonn Climate Change Conference, press conference by DCJ and members on June 7 2022

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ)  held a press conference on June 7 2022 during the United Nations’ Conference on Climate Change at Bonn. DCJ and its members shared the demands and expectations of grassroot communities and frontline climate crisis defenders from this conference. They will also highlight the corporate capture of climate change dialogue perpetuating false solutions and greenwashing by the fossil fuel industry as well as lack of government action to address and mitigate loss and damage and provide climate finance for the Global South communities.

SPEAKERS

Meena Raman – Third World Network (TWN)

Claire Miranda – Asian Peoples Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD)

Rachel Rose Jackson – Corporate Accountability International (CA)

Moderated by Alex Rafalowics – Fossil Fuel Non Proliferation Treaty

False Solutions, Fossil Farces, and Fake Finance: What to Expect at Bonn Climate Change Conference, a press conference by DCJ and members

Put Loss and Damage on COP27 Agenda NOW: DCJ and its members joined other CSOs for action on Loss and Damage on June 7 2022

Action demanding loss and damage to be put on #COP27 agenda by CSOs and DCJ members at Bonn during SB56
Action demanding loss and damage to be put on #COP27 agenda by CSOs and DCJ members at Bonn during SB56

Climate Justice Pathways for Real Zero, Real Finance, and Real Action: SB56 Side Event on June 10 2022

DCJ joined its members Corporate Accountability International, Global Forest Coalition, Asia Pacific Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD) and Friends of the Earth Togo to co-host side-event ‘Climate Justice Pathways for Real Zero, Real Finance, and Real Action’ at Bonn Climate Change Conference where they discussed pathways to rapidly enact a 1.5-centered just transition that decreases emissions to #RealZero, how to urgently scale up finance for adaptation, and Loss and Damage. 

SPEAKERS

Gadir Lavadenz, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

Claire Miranda, Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development

Kwami Kponzo, Friends of the Earth Togo/Global Forest Coalition

Simone Lovera, Global Forest Coalition

Moderated by Rachel Rose Jackson, Corporate Accountability

Climate Justice Pathways for Real Zero, Real Finance, and Real Action: Side Event by DCJ and its members

Click below to view the full side event.

Pay Up for Loss and Damage: CSO Action on Loss and Damage Finance on June 11 2022

Pay Up for Loss and Damage: CSO Action on Loss and Damage Finance
Claire Miranda of DCJ’s member organization Asian Peoples Movement on Debt and Development during the CSOs action on Loss and Damage at SB56

Two weeks of all talk and no walk: A rocky road to Sharm el-Sheikh: Press Conference by DCJ and members, June 15 2022

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) held a press conference on June 15 2022 during the United Nations’ Conference on Climate Change at Bonn. With just hours left for climate talks to conclude in Bonn before negotiators reconvene at COP 27, representatives of DCJ explained the current state of play at UNFCCC’s SBs, share African civil society’s core demands, and what to expect on the ground in Sharm el-Sheikh in November.

SPEAKERS

Meena Raman, Third World Network

Tetet Lauron, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation

Colin Besaans, Powershift Africa

Rachel Rose Jackson, Corporate Accountability International 

Moderated by Gadir Lavadenz, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

Two weeks of all talk and no walk: A rocky road to Sharm el-Sheikh: Press Conference by DCJ and members

ACT NOW on Climate Crisis: DCJ and its members joined a CSO Action on last day of Bonn Climate Change Conference

DCJ and its members joined other CSOs on last day of Bonn Climate Change Conference calling out for governments to stop talking and ACT NOW on climate crisis, to pay up for loss and damage and climate finance and to support real solutions and not false solutions.

ACT NOW on Climate Crisis: DCJ and its members joined a CSO Action on last day of Bonn Climate Change Conference
ACT NOW on Climate Crisis: DCJ and its members joined a CSO Action on last day of Bonn Climate Change Conference

Check out some of the other resources on Bonn Climate Change Conference from DCJ and it’s members below.

CSO intervention by DCJ during the joint opening plenary

CSO intervention by DCJ during the closing plenary

Closing comments from climate justice voices around the world on the conclusion of Bonn Climate Talks

Daily Newsletter by Third World Network on Bonn Climate Talks

SB56

Closing comments from climate justice voices around the world on the conclusion of Bonn Climate Talks, June 2022

Empty Words, Hollow Promises, and False Solutions Ring Loud at Bonn Conference on Climate Change

Once again, as world leaders are gathered at Bonn to discuss the climate crisis, we have wasted another opportunity to take climate action. Civil Society Organizations express their anger and disappointment at the empty words and hollow discussions that continue to push the world, especially the Global South further towards climate catastrophe.

Claire Miranda, Asian Peoples Movement on Debt and Development

The US and its allies have again made a mockery of the Bonn Climate Talks. All their statements on ambition and their shameless attempts to deprioritize adaptation and loss and damage compared to mitigation as if they are making progress on ending fossil fuels, are enraging. Instead of making clear commitments to mobilize and deliver climate finance, they advance all these dialogues and empty talk shops as smokescreens to hide their plans of escaping from their climate obligations in Sharm el-Sheik. The Global South will make sure this hideous escape plan fails.

Souparna Lahiri, Global Forest Coalition 

The Global North has shown that they are not only about blocking climate finance, but climate action as a whole. The US, EU, and others are not only trying to rewrite history to erase any record of their owed climate debt. They are also blocking global progress to advance on issues such as collaborating to implement real solutions (in Article 6.8) and blocking pathways to achieve rights-based and gender responsive climate justice. But we will not let the Global North rewrite history. They must right their wrongs and address their harms. Real Zero. Real Solutions. Real Climate finance. No Net and No Offsets. These must be the benchmarks for COP27. The failure to deliver on any of them will mean the US and EU have turned their backs on climate action.

Hellen Neima, Corporate Accountability International

One out of five people in Africa are suffering from hunger, and this is just one of countless ways the climate crisis is spurring devastation that is ripping through our communities. We have had enough of rich, polluting countries silencing those trying to fight for justice. We have had enough of your “net zero” scams that disguise a bucketload of false solutions and that are way too little, way too late. We have had enough of your calls for action all while continuing to ramp up fossil fuels. We have had enough of you offering crumbs with one hand while you starve the world with the other. We have had enough of our lives being valued as less worthy than Big Polluters’ profits. It’s time to kick big polluters out and make them pay for the harms they cause. Your empty words cannot fill our stomachs or protect our homelands. People in Africa are rising up and will continue to rise up, until the justice that is owed is delivered at COP27.

Silvia Ribeiro, ETC group

Instead of commitments for real GHG reductions and support to Global South for just transitions, we see an increasing push for risky geoengineering technofixes and new carbon markets, assaulting agricultural soils, forests, marine and coastal ecosystems. This is a new wave of threats to biodiversity, food sovereignty, livelihoods and already impacted communities. These dangerous false solutions are also wasting the little time we have to prevent further catastrophic climate change.  We strongly reject these new forms of carbon colonialism. We need real solutions and real zero. Hands OFF Mother Earth!

Meena Raman, Third World Network

The rich world in Glasgow at COP26 talked about keeping the 1.5 degree C goal alive. Yet, all their actions since then have shown that the statements made are hollow and they do not mean what they say and they are hypocritical. The rich world continues to ask the developing world to pump more fossil fuels, as they also expand their own domestic production to counter the on-going energy crisis.   This is despite the on-going climate impacts all around the world, including in their own countries with unprecedented heat waves, fires and massive flooding. 

It is clear that the rich world is completely addicted to fossil fuels and have not managed to transition to clean energy despite all the time they have had since the 1994 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change came into effect. All they have done thus far is to continue to consume the very little remaining carbon budget left to limit the 1.5 degree C limit. 

At the same time, pressing developing countries to pump more oil and gas to support their addiction at a time when the developing world needs to be supported in making the clean energy transition is irresponsible behaviour. 

Coming to the Bonn Climate Conference and pushing for more mitigation ambition from developing countries is perpetuating carbon colonialism, and going back on their commitments under the  Convention and Paris Agreement. It is time to expose the lies of the rich world, as they do not mean what they say and do not honour promises and commitments kept.

Wanun Permpibul, Climate Watch Thailand and member of Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development

Women in communities in Asia and the Pacific are already facing climate impacts. While finance for adaptation is needed, many of the impacts go beyond the reach of adaptation efforts, and providing real finance for loss and damage is crucial. Climate finance must be based on needs, ensure direct access to women and communities, and support the design and implementation of gender-responsive climate action across all sectors, including capacity strengthening for institutions on gender. Developed countries need to be reminded of their fundamental obligation to deliver public and grant-based finance, not loans to address the needs, lives, and livelihoods of women and communities on the ground. We must say no to private financing, whose profit-making interests lead to climate catastrophe and demand justice in climate finance, to deliver gender and climate justice.

Stephanie Cabovianco, Climate Save Movement

We cannot build climate justice without addressing food systems. Regarding agriculture negotiations, parties avoided mentioning “agroecology.” Even if not mentioned in the Koronivia text, we encourage governments to mobilize resources that create capacity building and education on agroecology and nutrition. The focus on agriculture should be on ensuring food security and resilience, based on nature and local communities, and not on dangerous carbon sequestration strategies. Agroecological approaches have been led by local farmers and indigenous peoples worldwide, particularly in the Global South. 

Sara Shaw, Friends of the Earth International

With only a few months until COP27 and the IPCC warning we have 3 years, if that, to peak carbon emissions, rich countries are sleep walking us all into catastrophe. The disconnect between the accelerating climate crisis outside the conference halls and the lack of concrete action inside is palpable. Developed countries refuse to even discuss long owed and vital loss and damage finance. Instead of taking action, rich countries are trying to shift responsibility for action to developing countries, while expanding their own plans to extract fossil fuels and chasing unproven technofixes. We know the solution is a rapid and equitable phase out of fossil fuels and a shift to people-centered renewables. The obstacle to this future is not developing countries, but developed countries doing all they can to escape from their responsibilities.

David Williams, Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung

We are seeing what scientists have long been projecting in real time. People are increasingly being hit by severe storms, floods, droughts and heatwaves. Marginalized communities are most affected, carrying the burden of climate inaction on the part of industrialized nations. Their avoidance of responsibility, or even acknowledgement thereof, never ceases to astonish.

Teresa Anderson, ActionAid International

With the climate crisis escalating every day, countries from the global south, representing six out seven people on the planet, were united in their plea for funding to help them recover and rebuild in the aftermath of climate disasters. But rich countries, particularly the EU, spiked the discussion about loss and damage at every single turn. Whether it was about setting up a new finance facility, providing funds, organizing technical support, or even just including the issue on the agenda for discussion at COP27 later this year, rich countries continued to block, block, block. 

At this very moment, 20 million people in the Horn of Africa are hovering on the brink of famine. There is a terrifying disconnect between the real world and some of the rich country negotiators who live in safe bubbles and feel able to turn their backs on the rest of humanity.

Susann Scherbarth, BUND/ Friends of the Earth Germany

Germany has a hell of an agenda next week when leading the G7 Summit from 26-28 June in the South of Germany. We urge G7 leaders to take clear action – and not just talking – and follow what civil society around the world is demanding: an equitable end to fossil fuels and get on track to a 1,5 degree climate just pathway to limit devastating climate impacts around the world. After two weeks of talks in Bonn the hope faded away to get clear commitments by rich nations to adequately finance devastating impacts of the climate crisis. Finance in trillions is urgently necessary for mitigation, adaptation and loss & damage. We do not only talk about technical numbers here, we actually talk about lives and deaths around the world. The plan to have a well prepared COP27, happening later this year in Egypt, failed.

Victor Menotti, Oakland Institute

US State Department negotiators in Bonn kept up their pressure on other countries to cut more emissions, but without providing any new finance to support less wealthy countries while President Biden is urging fossil fuel producers to pump more oil and expand gas exports to Europe.  The US is accelerating a reckless race to pollute our planet’s remaining atmospheric space when it should be the first and fastest to phase out fossil fuels.  Energy price inflation threatens the election of US climate champions in a few months but the answer is not pumping more fossil fuels but reducing demand and supporting other fossil fuel dependent countries in their own just transitions.

About DCJ

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) is a global network of over 200 grassroot, regional, and global networks and organisations advocating for climate justice

Contact Us

For more information, comments, reactions and quotes please reach out to us at

Rachitaa Gupta, Communication Officer, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice [email protected]  

Gadir Lavadenz, Global Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice [email protected]

Additional Information

Briefing on USA Obstruction
Download

Photos from Bonn (Please credit DCJ)

SB56

Intervention by Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice at SB56 Closing Plenary Session

June 16, 2022

Mr/Madam Chair,

This statement is delivered on behalf of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice. 

We want to denounce the current climate colonialism and the hypocrisy behind it. 

Thirty years ago this month, the UNFCCC was ceremoniously signed in Rio, yet countries who benefit most from the fossil fuels causing today’s climate crisis are still not weaning themselves away from their addiction. Contrary to their claims of keeping the 1.5C degrees alive, they continue today expanding their own fossil fuel use, now asking producers to pump more oil and gas – rather than reduce their own consumers’ demand – as the only cure to the current energy price crisis crushing poor countries and communities.

The world urgently needs a “fair shares phase out” of fossil fuels, but instead, talks in the past weeks only showed that rich nations’ emphasis on mitigation looks more like latching on to profitable private sector initiatives, lending them legitimacy by landing them in the UN.

Finance for developing countries continues to be shamefully low, not only for mitigation and adaptation but now also by running away from responsibilities for Loss and Damage.  Pay up, polluters. Own up to your climate debt, and historical responsibilities!

While visas are denied to many civil society leaders, the increased presence in Bonn of delegates representing corporate interests is evident especially in the Global Stocktake (GST). GST is our main tool to ratchet up action, but the heavy presence of corporate non-Party stakeholders risks drowning out peoples’ solutions for Real Zero.

Finally, DCJ warns against new attempts to convert our coasts and oceans into financial instruments and experimental sites for marine geoengineering technologies. Geoengineering is under moratoria at CBD and London Convention; UNFCCC must respect and reinforce these precautionary UN decisions. 

Thank you.

SB56

MEDIA ADVISORY

Two weeks of all talk and no walk: A rocky road to Sharm el-Sheikh

WHAT

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) is holding a press conference on June 15 2022 during the United Nations’ Conference on Climate Change at Bonn. With just hours left for climate talks to conclude in Bonn before negotiators reconvene at COP 27, representatives of DCJ will explain the current state of play at UNFCCC’s SBs, share African civil society’s core demands, and what to expect on the ground in Sharm el-Sheikh in November.

Bonn Climate Change Conference is the 56th session of the subsidiary bodies, which have been taking place from 6 to 16 June 2022, at the World Convention Center Bonn, Germany to prepare for the UN Climate Change Conference COP27 in November this year. This year the June sessions were focused on greenhouse gas emission reductions, adapting to climate impacts, and providing financial support for developing countries to cut emissions and adapt to climate change.

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) is a global network of over 200 grassroot, regional, and global networks and organisations advocating for climate justice.

WHEN

June 15, 2022 | 10.45 – 11.15 am CET

WHERE

Press Conference Room Nairobi 4 in the World Conference Center Bonn (WCCB), Platz der Vereinten Nationen 2, 53113 Bonn

Online Link: https://unfccc.int/event/environmental-non-governmental-organizations-engo-delegation/organization-global-campaign-to-demand 

SPEAKERS

  • Meena Raman, Third World Network
  • Tetet Lauron, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation
  • Colin Besaans, Powershift Africa
  • Rachel Rose Jackson, Corporate Accountability International 

MODERATOR

Gadir Lavadenz, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

CONTACT

For questions and concerns, please contact:
Rachitaa Gupta, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice at [email protected] or Gadir Lavadenz, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice at [email protected]

SB56

Intervention by Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice at SB56 Joint Opening Plenary

June 6, 2022

(Delivered by Gadir Lavadenz, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice)

Mr/Madam Chair,

This statement is delivered on behalf of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice.

First, we want to express our deepest solidarity with all those impacted by wars and other acts of violence in our world today. 

Second, we want to ask delegates: Why will Bonn be any different than before?

Globally, we are facing war financed by the same fossil fuels warming our planet. Are governments going to address fossil fuel dependency properly?

Loss and damage impacts are more evident than ever affecting the people least responsible for climate change.  Will the top historical polluters still run away from their responsibilities?

Finance remains far below the promised $100 billion as the Green Climate Fund runs dry, and the most-polluting Parties avoid any new discussion of concrete figures. Will Parties legally responsible for providing climate finance deliver on their international obligations?

Polluting countries and corporations have already locked in the use of dangerous and ineffective carbon markets through Article 6.2 and 6.4. Now, Parties have an opportunity to advance real solutions that will reduce emissions through Article 6.8. Will they take this opportunity or keep focusing on dangerous distractions? 

Global stock taking starts as new data shows 40% of developed fossil fuel reserves must stay in the ground to limit warming within 1.5C.  But will we watch yet another discussion end without action?  

Given the moment of urgency we are living in, we denounce the hyper focus on Net Zero, Nature-based solutions, geoengineering and other distractions that derail us from addressing the real estructural causes of climate change. 

Finally and respectfully, we hope that under your guidance time allocation is managed in a way that allows us to speak to an actual crowd instead of to an empty room. 

Thank you very much

People power climate justice!

SB50

Political Science

26 Comments

“Science has been deleted from the Paris Agreement!”

Variations of this headline dominated the coverage of SB50 negotiations in Bonn. 

Say Goodbye to IPCC Report : Countries are about to agree to have no science in the Paris Agreement

The idea began early in the week when Saudi Arabia raised procedural concerns with the agenda item relating to the IPCC Special Report on 1.5, which was published in October last year. 

The Saudis said that the topic should be discussed under an existing agenda item, not a new stand-alone agenda item. After some back-and-forth, the SBSTA chair proposed that Parties have a “substantive” exchange of views on the topic, and conclude the agenda item at that session in Bonn. Everyone agreed. 

But then the headlines came.

Before going any further it must be said for the avoidance of confusion that the Kingdom has spent many years and millions of dollars undermining the climate science of the IPCC, and making sure negotiations in the UNFCCC do not set ambitious mitigation goals. 

This is unsurprising for a country whose economy is wholly based on oil. They are trying to buy time. 

But for many complex reasons they have been made into the sole villain of a long-running play with an abundance of villains, including some truly evil geniuses. 

For example, the United States had in fact opposed the actual IPCC Special Report back in October…

And again, along with Saudi, Kuwait, and Russia, in Poland last December…

Yet this time around it was only Saudi who grabbed the headlines.

UN report on 1.5C blocked from climate talks after Saudi Arabia disputes science

Very little of the coverage explored the reasoning behind some of the statements. Thankfully Third World Network does that, and reports what exactly was said by whom, so you can judge for yourself.

An unfortunate reality that has been caught up in the “science denialism” is the fact that there are in fact gaps in the IPCC reports.  The IPCC readily acknowledges this. It is not a controversial statement, nor should stating it serve to undermine the basic findings of the IPCC.

In fact, science, and in particular climate science, is always political. From the selection of authors, to decisions about what qualifies as acceptable literature to peer-review, to the negotiation of the summary for policymakers, the entire process – like any aspect of life – is political. The IPCC is not immune from assumptions which are anything but neutral, including assumptions built in to the models about how much we will have to rely on certain unproven technologies…

Nature article confirms: IPCC assumptions about BECCS ignore environmental and wider climate impacts

None of this changes the fact that the IPCC is the best available science. 

What’s not clear is that a failure to enthusiastically welcome IPCC under the relative insignificance of a stand-alone SBSTA conclusion actually… matters. 

It’d be nice, but what matters more is what countries do. Is their NDC in line with what the IPCC says is required to remain below 1.5 agrees warming? 

Is the money that rich countries are putting on the table commensurate with the financial needs of poorer countries to deliver their NDCs? 

It is interesting that there was not so much coverage of stories about how rich countries conspired to delete references to conflicts of interest, or how peddlers of false solutions kept forcing their free-market ideology down our throats. And we have to ask why were these issues trumped by procedural bickering about a report which has already been written, and its negotiated summary widely circulated. 

Or why the headline for every single news outlet was not this:

Or this

SB50

Corporate Power

6 Comments

Although these negotiations are formally between states, because we live in a world so significantly shaped by trans-national corporations, the reality is that corporate power influences the agenda, specific outcomes, and the overall direction of the talks in a big way.

Don’t believe us? Check out this epic thread on twitter which points out some of the cosy connections and easy access enjoyed by these pimps of misery.

This is not just the word of activists. AFP reached the same conclusions.

The issue has been around since the first day of the talks, and actually before. Jeremy Leggett’s “The Carbon War” is an illustrative glimpse into corporate interference in the mid to late-90s. Here’s a report about how it all works.

The trend has continued into the Paris Agreement era.

It’s actually something the fossil fuel industry has itself boasted about. However, more and more people are waking up to the greenwash tactic deployed by the largest polluters.

Don’t Be Fooled by Fossil Fuel Companies’ Green Exterior

After years of highlighting the situation without being able to do anything about it, four years ago some members of the climate justice community identified a potential policy avenue through negotiations under “arrangements for intergovernmental meetings.” As Corporate Accountability write in their blog (below), together we launched a “campaign calling to kick Big Polluters out of climate policy. Backed by hundreds of thousands of people like you around the world, government delegates from the Global South have been uniting to demand a conflict-of-interest policy that could protect the U.N. climate treaty from industry interference.”

Bonn Climate Change Conference 2019: What to watch for

Although “Powerful Global North governments, like the U.S. and EU, have consistently sided with Big Polluters to maintain the status quo” the issue was still on the agenda this year. And it was most certainly on our agenda.

The above press conference webcast and the video below explain a little bit more about the efforts being taken.

What's going on at the global climate talks?

The U.N. climate talks happening NOW are the most important meetings you’ve never heard of — and Big Polluters are in the room undermining them. TODAY, governments have the chance to advance a conflict-of-interest policy that could finally begin to protect the treaty from polluters’ interests. But a handful of Global North governments are standing in the way.You can help show them the world is watching, and asking them to choose: people or polluters?

Posted by Corporate Accountability on Wednesday, June 19, 2019
Governments have yet to discuss Big Polluters’ role in climate talks–but civil society wastes no time

However, because “arrangements for intergovernmental meetings” is not explicitly a space to talk about conflicts of interest and how to handle impropriety, the deck is stacked in favour of countries who don’t want to deal with the issue. Naturally, this was exactly what they did – putting forward proposals on other topics, such as the frequency of meetings, to deliberately provoke long-winded conversations and crowd out the agenda. In spite of developing countries and civil society raising concerns about the dangerous influence of vested interests, the issue did not advance and the decision coming out of Bonn represents a concerted effort on behalf of developed countries like the US, EU, Japan, and Norway, including by reverting to a classic divide-and-rule tactic as suggested below.

Bonn talks: Bassey alleges US, global north attempting to silence Africa

The inside story was not well covered by journalists, who instead ran with a fictitious “the science has been deleted from the Paris Agreement” angle. But AFP did devote some coverage, exposing the ludicrous position of developed countries.

Although the campaign to limit the influence of vested interests in the UNFCC must carry on to another round without many major breakthroughs (yet) the Overton window has absolutely shifted, to the point where the below is possible.

SB50

The issues

23 Comments
Photo Credit: ENB/Kiara Worth

Some of the issues being discussed here in Bonn are outlined here in the ever-excellent Third World Network’s curtain raiser.

Or, if you’re really nerdy, you can read the “reflections note” by the chair of one of the negotiation track.

The ins and outs of the negotiations, which sometimes take several days to even adopt their agendas, can be followed in more detail via the Third World Network updates or the Earth Negotiations Bulletins or of course, on our twitter.

From a climate justice perspective, we have the same, as yet unmet, demands and overriding priorities in Bonn as we did in Katowice before the rulebook was agreed.

As the negotiations progress we will agitate for: a conflict of interest policy to prevent corporations from weakening the rules; support for countries that are hit by climate impacts to rebuild and pick up the pieces after disasters; and measures to prevent countries from exploiting loopholes to carry on polluting while pretending to be “neutral” through offsets.