Tag Archives: UNFCCC

Press Releases

Quote sheet for SB62 Outcome. 


Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) 

KEY RESOURCES 1. Op-ed on Germany’s role in blocking climate action (English, German)  2. DCJ Finance Brief authored by Victor Menotti 3. New Research on Carbon Offsets by Corporate Accountability 4. Four countries responsible for nearly 70% of projected CO2 pollution from new oil and gas – Oil Change international 5. Civil Society Letter to UNFCCC Secretariat on censorship of Palestine Solidarity. 7. List of demands from Palestinian COP30 Coalition 7. World’s largest expansion of fossil fuels on the Gulf Coast of the USA, more than all other countries combined. 8. Establishing a UNFCCC Accountability Framework to protect against undue influence of polluting interests

CONTACT For media enquiries: Esthappen S, Communications Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (Whatsapp: +91 9820918910, Email: [email protected])

QUOTE SHEET Covering climate finance, adaptation, l&d, JT and other UNFCCC linked agendas with links to genocide in Palestine, wars waged by league of colonisers on global south and inequities in the climate regime and finance architecture.

Format: Name, organisation: Quote.  

  1. Meena Raman, Third World Network:
    The biggest disagreement at Bonn was over the failure of the Global North to address or even listen to the concerns of the Global South. Right at the start, developing countries wanted to discuss how to treat provision of finance from developed countries (Art 9.1 of the Paris Agreement) with the G77 and China wanting a discussion on the agenda but developing countries blocked even a conversation. Whenever developing countries get into the provision of means of implementation (MOI) and finance, developed countries always push back by involving the private sector and muddy the mandate by introducing mobilization. On Global Goals on Adaptation, a key agenda for the Global South, which is an effort to see whether the peoples of the world and countries will be able to adapt through developing indicators starting 2023 eg. On water, health, food, ecosystems… developing countries want to have indicators on means of implementation. But developed countries have opposed this, they want indicators on eg. Official Development Assistance (ODA) as part of adaptation that is not new and additional finance. Developed countries have also refused to talk about finance for formulation and implementation of National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). The Global South wants finance for adaptation, but the Global North takes the Do It Yourself (DIY) approach whenever it comes to implementing climate action in developing countries and their mandatory obligation to provide finance to the South. On Carbon Border Adjustment Measures (CBAM) or unilateral measures which the EU is pushing and Canada, UK are also thinking about introducing, they don’t want to make space for any meaningful discussion which allows for the ventilation of Global South concerns and understanding what impacts these policies have on climate action in the Global South. On the Technology Implementation Program (TIP), they don’t want to talk about intellectual property rights as a barrier to technology transfer and affordable access. Finally, on the UAE Dialogue (Paragraph 97 of the GST Outcome), the big fight has been about the scope. Para 97 falls under the MOI section so developing countries understand it as part of finance discussion, but the Global North is again not aligned. I say it takes two-to-tango but the Global North has left the Global South alone on the dance floor of negotiations at Bonn.  
  2. Lidy Nacpil, Asian People’s Movement for Debt and Development:
    Even as global temperatures reach record-breaking heights, Global North governments continue to be the biggest blockers of climate justice. Following the outrageous outcome of COP29, the Global North continued to dodge their climate finance obligations at SB62–most egregiously blocking a discussion of Article 9.1–while ramping up military spending to 5% of their GDPs. By refusing to honor their climate commitments and preventing progress in these negotiations, the Global North is jeopardizing our world, risking our lives, and killing the Paris Agreement. In spite of these obstructions, which do not bode well for Belém, we look forward to waging our fights at COP30. This world is ours, and we must fight to reclaim it from the polluters, profiteers, and perpetrators of injustice who have brought it to the brink of chaos.
  3. Rachitaa Gupta, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice:
    We are the communities on the frontlines of a crisis we did not create—a crisis driven by greed, war, and colonialism. At these climate talks all we saw was the world’s richest governments pour trillions into war machines, fund genocide in Palestine, and protect corporate profit over human life while failing to deliver on their historical responsibility through real public finance. Choosing instead to privatize our lands, forests and water through carbon markets and offsets while sabotaging any meaningful just transition. We condemn the UNFCCC Secretariat’s censorship of civil society for standing in solidarity with Palestine—and we will not be silenced. Climate justice cannot exist in a world where bombs continue to rain on Gaza and corporate power continues to write climate policy. Fight for climate justice is the fight for liberation, everywhere. And at COP30 we will show it is people’s power and not the rich that will shape the future.
  4. Alison Doig, Recourse:
    At the Bonn talks, the private sector has been making a bid to capture the little public climate finance available. We heard a lot about capital markets, green bonds, public-private blending, and multilateral development banks’ role in de-risking, but not nearly enough about the needs of climate-vulnerable communities, women, youth and nature. Ahead of COP30 in Belem, the Brazilian Presidency should re-assert that climate finance must be for grants supporting a just transition to a climate-safe world, not for lining bankers’ pockets.”
  5. Amiera Sawas, Head of Research & Policy, Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative:
    As the Northern hemisphere suffers deadly heatwaves, UN climate talks remain frozen in an out-of-touch process. War and military spending escalated outside, while inside there was no discussion—and no finance. Civil society fought to bring negotiations into the real world, but geopolitics and the fossil fuel lobby kept derailing progress. Even successes, like the draft text for the ‘Just Transition Work Programme’ informed by workers and Indigenous Peoples, were nearly paralyzed by fossil fuel interests at the end. We are already at risk of breaching the 1.5 temperature limit, there’s no time for paralysis. There’s a real risk that the UN climate talks fail to address the crisis’s biggest drivers: coal, oil, and gas. We cannot afford any more failure, we must urgently do better. And we will – whether inside or outside the UN. Brazil is talking big but its actions speak louder than words and its recent approval of new oil extraction in the Amazon is the worst possible signal.
  6. Rachel Rose Jackson, Director of Climate Research & Policy, Corporate Accountability:
    These talks have become completely divorced from the reality of the climate crisis. While trillions of dollars are being poured into nuclear war by the very same governments that are responsible for climate change—and while the very same corporations that knowingly fueled the climate crisis are getting even richer off of these wars—not a penny is offered to the countries and communities already facing life or death from the climate crisis. While countries around the world cave to authoritarianism and the far right, these talks pander to this agenda, rather than resist it. Bonn should have filled in the potholes on the rocky road to Belém. Instead, the road to Belém is now paved with landmines, and the work ahead of us is harder than it has ever been. The signposts on the road to COP30 are clearly marked. End the ability of Big Polluters to write the rules of climate action. Global North governments must do their fair share of climate action and pay their climate debt. End fossil fuels justly and urgently. Reject dangerous distractions and fast-track to Real Zero. Center those on the frontlines—Indigenous Peoples, communities of color, those in the Global South—not Big Polluters. Will world governments course correct immediately, or will they push us off a cliff.
  7. Romain Ioualalen, Global Policy lead at Oil Change International:
    Bonn saw the Global North further retreat from its responsibilities to provide public finance for climate action, instead promoting fabricated narratives on private finance filling the gap – despite evidence the market-led approach is not delivering. On top of blocking finance, rich countries failed their homework on fossil fuels with four Global North countries responsible for 70% of projected oil and gas expansion, which made calls from developed parties to center the fossil fuel phaseout in the negotiations continue to ring hollow and hypocritical. However, an outcome on just transition in Belém is within reach and could provide momentum for centering justice in the transition.
  8. Victor Menotti, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice:
    Bonn’s SB62 took the world backwards from even the Baku Debacle, putting COP30 host Brazil in a sticky situation for sweltering Belem…or Rio? Although Trump has pulled out of the Paris Agreement once again, his pressuring NATO members to spend 5% of GDP on military expansion has sucked all the oxygen out of the otherwise balmy air in Bonn. Developed countries operate a three-prong offensive to counter developing country demands for climate justice: 1) to stop any significant discussion on providing finance per legal commitments under Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement, as Berlin’s budget due next month means their record borrowing for mainly US defense contractors leaves little to nothing for cutting emissions and adapting to climate impacts in the Global South; 2) to attack Global South countries for their lack of “ambition” in reducing emissions — and pressuring them to do more — despite failing to offer sufficient finance and zero flexibility on WTO patent rules that prevent technology transfer; 3) to keep financing their own fossil fuels frenzy, as Europe and Asia increase investment in LNG export facilities on the US Gulf South, one of four developed countries (along with Canada, Norway and Australia) that make up 70% of planned fossil fuel expansion by 2030.Geopolitics may make the most headlines today, but the Global North’s conduct in international climate talks only expedites the pre-eminence of changing geophysics.
  9. Coraina de la Plaza, Coordinator, Hands Off Mother Earth Alliance:
    We will continue to resist geoengineering inside and outside the UN space, and reminding governments that our planet is not a laboratory but a shared HOME that we all must protect through proven and just sustainable solutions and not by experimenting with risky and unproven geoengineering schemes.
  10. Seranya Solanki, Alliance of Non Governmental Radical Youth:
    Despite the opposition from developed countries and attempts to kill the just transition work programme, we were able to achieve a text in SB62 that would create the space and momentum for the UNFCCC to deliver concrete actions on Just Transition in Belem cop30 for affected workers and communities – that recognises that people-centric, bottom-up, whole-of-society approaches are required to achieve just transitions. Unilateral trade measures have a space to be discussed here on how trade measures in general affect or restrict just transition at the national level especially for countries in the global south – already burdened with high debt burdens and the impacts of climate change. We cannot sacrifice ambition in the mechanism in order to secure any old unjust deal on just transition where rights, justice and equity are ignored. It has taken decades to have a just transition on the international table in the climate negotiations. We are concerned at how parties, despite providing rhetoric on the need for inclusivity and participation of rights holders, have not concretised these principles through operative decisions, which is why we are pushing for a COP30 decision text on calling on countries to establish national institutions for peoples’ participation – where we can guarantee that rights holders are involved in the planning and implementation of just transition measures and policies at the national and local levels. We remain vigilant against the antics of parties who either want to delete all references to fossil fuels or weaken any language on means of implementation. There can be no global Just Transition without an equitable and just phaseout of fossil fuels with developed countries taking immediate action and providing the necessary means of implementation to developing countries with the least historical responsibility for climate change but are most vulnerable to its impacts.
  11. David Williams, Head of International Climate Justice Program, Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung:
    After years of refusing to pay up for climate finance, the EU has this week shown at the NATO conference in The Hague that the money in fact had been available all along. With the frequency and intensity of droughts, heatwaves, floods, and other climate change impacts increasing across the world, those who have caused the crisis are persisting in their abdication of responsibility. Climate finance is not charity, it is an obligation enshrined in international law under the Paris Agreement. With the US exiting various international treaties, the EU cannot hide any more, having to position itself clearly on where it stands in terms of upholding international law. This is an opportunity to rebuild trust and solidarity with the Global South in times of geopolitical turmoil. Whether the EU will seize this opportunity is another question. The early warning signs are deeply concerning.
Press Releases

Global North takes Bonn climate talks backward when we need big advances before Belém (Links to key docs from SB62) 

MEDIA ADVISORY

For Immediate Release

With the US absent at 62nd session of the UNFCCC’s Subsidiary Bodies (SBs) in Bonn, the EU has now become the biggest blocker of climate justice before COP30 in Belem. Not only have we seen officials from Brussels block an agenda item to discuss their failure to deliver on their commitments for climate finance, but NATO countries have just today approved to spend 5% of their GDP on weapons for war.

It takes two-to-tango but the European Union (EU), Umbrella Group and Environmental Integrity Group (EIG) have left the Global South hanging on the dancefloor of negotiations. By blocking critical proposals from the developing countries and refusing to honor the fundamental commitments under the United Nations Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Paris Agreement, the developed countries are jeopardising  the world’s chances of dealing with the looming climate collapse. Not crises, not catastrophe⸺a collapse.   

Instead of rising to the moment, developed countries are blocking advancements on the Just Transition Work Programme and peddling dangerous distractions— carbon markets, offsets, techno fixes, and other false solutions— that serve polluters, not people. 

Join the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) and its members in a press conference on the ‘Outcomes from Bonn’ calling out the blockers of a safe future for the world. 

WHEN 26th June 2025, 10:30 am (GMT+2) Watch live. 

WHERE Nairobi 4, Main building, Inside the World Conference Center, Bonn, Germany 

WHO 

  • Meena Raman, Third World Network
  • Seranya Solanki, Alliance of Non Governmental Radical Youth
  • Dylan Hamilton, Alliance of Non Governmental Radical Youth
  • Victor Menotti, DCJ US Coordinator 
  • Moderated by Rachitaa Gupta, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

CONTACT Esthappen S, Communications Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (Whatsapp: +91 9820918910, Email: [email protected])

KEY RESOURCES 1. Op-ed on Germany’s role in blocking climate action (English, German)  2. DCJ Finance Brief authored by VIctor Menotti 3. New Research on Carbon Offsets by Corporate Accountability 4. Four countries responsible for nearly 70% of projected CO2 pollution from new oil and gas – Oil Change international 5. CIvil Society Letter to UNFCCC Secretariat on censorship on Palestine Solidarity. 6. Quote sheet on Bonn outcomes. 7. List of demands from Palestinian COP30 Coalition 8. World’s largest expansion of fossil fuels on the Gulf Coast of the USA, more than all other countries combined.  

Resources

Germany’s role on the Global Stage is fractured

Op-ed by Meena Raman and David Williams

First published in Africa News Analysis in English and German.

Just as the German government agrees to spending billions of Euros primarily for military spending and domestic infrastructure, it is blocking any meaningful discussions on the provision of climate finance at mid-year climate negotiations currently underway in Bonn. Instead of using its diplomatic influence to lobby for a progressive position within the EU (the negotiation bloc within which Germany is a key driving force), Germany has not shown any discernible willingness to improve the catastrophic outcome on climate finance from COP29 in Azerbaijan last year. It would appear that when money is needed for military spending and fossil fuel subsidies, then money can readily be found. However, when money is needed to fulfil obligations under international law, then money is few and far between.

This year’s negotiations in Bonn are essential to lay the foundations for a successful COP30 in Brazil later this year. A letter by the Brazilian COP presidency circulated a few weeks before the climate talks in Bonn emphasized the importance for officials to prevent “procrastination and postponement of decisions” in order to be best prepared heading in to the negotiations in Brazil. However, the talks in Bonn were fractious from the beginning, as the EU blocked a proposal by the G77 + China (a negotiating bloc representing 134 developing countries in the Global South, accounting for around 80% of the world’s population) to include climate finance from industrialized nations to developing countries on the negotiation agenda. This could have enabled a discussion on which countries specifically would provide climate finance, an aspect which was severely watered down at last year’s COP29 in Baku. While a compromise was eventually found in Bonn to add the proposal as a footnote, essentially kicking the can down the road, it caused a significant two-day delay for negotiations to begin.

The Paris Agreement (celebrating its 10-year anniversary) stipulates that industrialized countries must provide finance to developing countries for responding to climate change. In times when many countries are straddled by an ever-increasing debt burden, most do not have the financial resources to invest in transitioning away from fossil fuels. In addition, developing countries also need financial support for adapting and rebuilding after extreme weather events such as floods, heatwaves, or droughts, which are increasing in frequency and intensity with every degree of warming. Countries such as Germany are therefore committed under international law to provide finance to affected countries. This is not a matter of charity or even benevolence, as it is so often portrayed — it is a moral obligation, rooted in the reality that the countries which achieved economic growth through the heavy use of fossil fuels now bear a responsibility to support those who are suffering the consequences.

For decades, Germany’s robust economic growth and commitment to upholding international law through diplomacy have contributed to its positive reputation on the global stage. In recent years however, Germany has alienated countries from the Global South by flagrantly disregarding the core principles of international law by supporting war crimes and genocide committed against Palestinians, and preventing substantial progress on climate finance. Amid geopolitical turbulence, Germany must realign its diplomatic strategy to build strong, trust-based relationships with countries and communities in the Global South, guided by a spirit of solidarity.

About the authors: 

Currently Head of Programmes at the Third World Network (TWN), which is an independent non-profit international research and advocacy organisation involved in issues relating to sustainable development, environment and climate change, developing countries and North South affairs, Meena is also a practicing public interest lawyer and an expert on climate change negotiations, a former member on the Board of the Green Climate Fund. 

David Samuel Williams is a scholar on Global Transformation and Environmental Change and researcher who has worked with communities particularly affected by climate change in Durban, South Africa, and Mauritius. He is particularly interested in how climate change exacerbates inequality and works at the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung.  

Meena Raman and David Williams are both members of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ)

Letters

Civil Society Protest Against UNFCCC Secretariat’s Arbitrary Censorship of Solidarity with Palestine

Bonn, 20th June 2025

Civil society constituencies participating in the UNFCCC climate negotiations have today shared an open letter with all Parties to the Convention, raising urgent concerns over the UNFCCC Secretariat’s arbitrary and escalating censorship of peaceful expressions of solidarity with the Palestinian people.

The letter – signed by the Women and Gender Constituency, YOUNGO, and Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations – the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) and Climate Action Network (CAN), calls attention to the Secretariat’s recent decision to prohibit the use of the phrase “End the Siege” during a planned action at SB62 in Bonn, despite allowing language such as “end the genocide.” 

Read the letter here:

Your Excellencies,

We write to you today with grave concern and indignation.

As civil society, we have been a part of the UNFCCC for close to three decades. Our engagement has included advocating for and bringing voices of peoples and communities on the frontlines through actions and press conferences inside the UNFCCC amongst others. For the last two years in the UNFCCC sessions, COP’s and SB’s, we have faced an escalating pattern of arbitrary censorship from the UNFCCC Secretariat—specifically targeting expressions of solidarity with the Palestinian peoples.

Despite our repeated efforts to navigate and comply with an increasingly ambiguous and inconsistent set of restrictions, the Secretariat has continued to impose arbitrary limits on our collective rights. Legitimate, peaceful expressions of solidarity—statements, words, signs, and slogans that align with international human rights and international humanitarian law—have been censored or blocked.

This situation has reached a new and deeply troubling low. The UNFCCC Secretariat, in a response to an application for a Palestine solidarity action in the venue of SB62, communicated that they could not authorise the use of the phrase “End the Siege” in the banners and any accompanying text. As they did not object to the other phrases we use, including “end the genocide”, their focus on the siege wording is unusual and perplexing. This further demonstrates the arbitrariness of their decision-making.

The reason provided by the UNFCCC Secretariat was their need to “maintain a neutral and constructive environment that supports open dialogue among Parties”, and authorisation must be assessed in light of the current context. We struggle to understand how a clamp down on the calling out of an ongoing and well-documented humanitarian catastrophe can be considered neutral, particularly when the UN Secretary General, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and representatives of other UN bodies have called for the same thing using the same language. In addition, a majority of states who are also Parties to the UNFCCC process have voted for a resolution in the UN General Assembly demanding an immediate and lasting ceasefire and an end to the blockade in Gaza. To silence the call to “End the Siege” is to condone it.

This is no longer a question of procedure or neutrality. It is picking a side, and in this case, a side that does not align with the UN’s own values and international humanitarian law. Civil society has decided to end our negotiations on Palestinian Solidarity actions with the Secretariat that compromises our rights to civic space and freedom of expression within this space. We refuse to accept a decision that directly contradicts the rights and freedoms that the UN was founded to protect. We have therefore decided to make our grievances public in the hope that all people of conscience will support basic human rights and bring it to the attention of Parties because the UNFCCC Secretariat’s attempts at silencing us is done in the name of Parties.

The climate crisis is inseparable from questions of justice and human rights. The Paris Agreement itself is emphatic that “Parties should, when taking action to address climate change, respect, promote and consider their respective obligations on human rights […]”

The Secretariat’s refusal to acknowledge an unfolding crime against humanity, together with its active suppression of calls to end the genocide and siege, and doing so in the name of Parties in the UNFCCC, has deeply shaken our confidence in this body’s ability to safeguard humanity’s future. This is a sentiment that echoes far beyond these walls, and risks making multilateralism irrelevant to humanity.

The UNFCCC Secretariat’s narrow understanding of climate, ignoring its intersections with civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights, not only is contrary to the Convention and the Paris Agreement but will lead to a failure in finding systematic and sustained solutions to the climate crisis.

We appeal to Parties to reaffirm the rights of civil society, particularly our freedom of expression in calling out a genocide and the vested interests that uphold this as well as the climate crisis.

Silence is not neutrality.

Sincerely,

Women and Gender Constituency (WGC)

Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations – Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (ENGO/DCJ)

Environment Non-Governmental Organisations – Climate Action Network (ENGO/CAN)

Children and Youth Constituency (YOUNGO)

Press Releases

DCJ Press brief: Key issues to watch out for at the June Climate Meetings (SB62)

Report on climate and events like COP but leaving out the Bonn negotiations? 
Journalists and climate communicators have much to gain from the June Climate Meetings: Set the narrative: Early bird gets the most traction. Bonn is a chance to introduce new narratives and issues the world will focus on. Be ahead in the game. Build relationships: Everyone is too busy during the COP. Build your key relationships for the year with experts, activists, scientists and movement leaders. Investigative pieces: Bonn is a great moment to start working on a long form piece. There are no rushed timelines, experts have time for longer interviews, and you get the time to work on an in-depth report and release it in time for COP. 
Not able to make it to Germany, no worries! We have set up a Media hub for you to receive updates everyday. Click on this link. For more information on any issues or in-depth interviews with experts and movement leaders, write to [email protected] or Whatsapp +91 9820918910. 

Bonn Press Brief

The 62nd meeting of the Subsidiary Bodies (SB62) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) taking place in Bonn, Germany, from June 16th-June 26th, 2025. will be the first time governments gather after a deeply disappointing failure to deliver new climate finance commitments at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan. 

Almost one-quarter of the Parties to the Paris Agreement either rejected or registered reservations about the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) decision before Azerbaijan’s COP29 President unabashedly bulldozed through its adoption, stage-managed by UNFCCC’s Executive Secretary. Along with Article 6 carbon markets standards which were adopted by a highly unconventional process that avoided any customary formal approval by Parties, Baku’s two top finance deliverables remain dubious, containing no mandates for any meaningful actions after Belem’s COP30. Combining non-commitments under Article 2.1c to align all financial flows with the 1.5C temperature goal, only the delivery of non-negotiated reports are required at COP30, leaving a rough road for climate finance with no certain future beyond Belem.

Global North governments have historically used these meetings to promote deceptive finance, false solutions and neo-colonial schemes. These policies and frameworks deepen the inequalities and delay the urgent system change we need to prevent climate collapse. Bonn’s climate conference also begins a new chapter of geopolitical changes where US President Trump’s global trade war accelerates economic deglobalization amid intensifying resource competition while ongoing genocidal wars are recasting government priorities, resulting in repositioning negotiators’ expectations. Add in Trump’s second exit from the Paris Agreement and our world is left wandering further off-track from 1.5C without participation of the nation with the most historical responsibility to reduce emissions and respective capabilities to provide finance and technology.

With the exit of US, this is a crucial moment for Global South governments and movements to hold the leaders of the richest, industrialised nations accountable and stop their schemes to derail climate action, distort the agenda of Just Transition and adaptation, and escape from their historical and legal obligations under the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement.

At a time when the climate crisis is reaching catastrophic levels, with the Global South being least responsible but most affected, the negotiations in Bonn will determine whether COP30 in Belém becomes a moment of reckoning or turns out to be another co-opt by Global North governments and their corporates to orchestrate their Great Escape from historical responsibility.

Key policy documents

(Click to open)Third World Network: Curtain Raiser on SB 62 DCJ Finance brief

Key moments

Every day: DCJ Daily Press Conference on Global South perspectives at 10.00 am in Nairobi press conference room
16th June: Mobilisation on Palestine Solidarity on opening day outside the venue followed by press conference by Palestinian groups at 10am at the Nairobi press conference room 
17th June: ‘Defuel the Genocide: Global Energy Embargo on Israel Now’ press conference at 10am at the Nairobi press conference room
18th June: Kick Big Polluters Out mobilisation at 8am outside the venue followed by press conference at 10am at the Nairobi press conference room
18th June: Civil society-cross-constituency led just transition day with various activities
19th June: DCJ opening press conference on Global North’s blocking climate action and efforts to use climate negotiations to perpetuate their colonial agenda 
24th June: Side Event on Peoples Summit, a global convening of peoples’ movements during COP30 in Brazil
25th June: Side Event on Real Solutions: A system transformation approach to equitable and just transition

Key research from members 

– Global Green New Deal: Just, equitable and ecological transition in the face of collapse – War on Want.
– Top Global North Countries Responsible for nearly 70% of projected new oil and gas expansion to 2035 – Oil Change International. Making – FInancial flows consistent with climate-resilient development: Role of International financial institutions and standard settlers – Recourse

Key policy focus

  1. Solidarity with Palestinian resistance 
  1. Defuel the Genocide: Global Energy Embargo on Israel Now.

Press conference demanding that the COP30 host government, Brazil, end all crude oil and refined products exports to Israel, demonstrating its seriousness towards addressing the genocide and climate change. The speakers will also address the governments of the USA, Colombia, Brazil, South Africa, Azerbaijan, Nigeria, Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Russia, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Gabon, to demand an end to the transfer of coal, crude oil and petroleum to Israel, and pressuring energy corporations that are most implicated in supplying Israel during the genocide, particularly Glencore, Drummond, SOCAR, BP and

Chevron. Additionally, also call on Egypt, the EU, and other countries to end gas purchases from Israel and stop companies from profiteering from Israel’s settler-colonial occupation, apartheid, and genocide.

Press conference recording. 

Resources for journalists 

  1. End the Siege, End the Genocide: No Climate Justice Under Occupation

A peaceful protest intended to show the deep outrage of the climate movement at the ongoing genocide in Palestine. As Israel continues its brutal campaign of bombing, massacres and starvation against an innocent civilian population, many of the actors and states that are directly responsible for these crimes walk the halls of the climate negotiations. The protest is to remind them of the deep interlinkages between the intersecting crises of climate, capitalism, colonialism, militarism, violence and genocide. And that they cannot separate climate justice and the cause of Palestinian liberation. The protest will be followed by a press conference in the June Climate Meetings (SB 62) press conference room.   

WHEN Protest timings: June 16th, 8:00 AM. Press conference timings: June 16th, 10 AM. 

WHERE Protest venue: World Conference Center Entrance (Metro stop: Heussallee/Museumsmeile). Press conference venue: Nairobi 4, Main building. 

Press release

Resources for journalists on the protest and press conference. 

Recording of press conference.  

  1. Discussions on Just Transition Mechanism

The climate justice movement believes that this is a make-or-break year for just transition in the UNFCCC. One more year without substantial and actionable decisions on just transition will render the Just Transition Work Program (JTWP) into a permanent talk shop not worth renewing after it expires in 2026 as per article 3 of the COP28 JTWP Decision. Furthermore, the JTWP should not be seen as another platform to push for prescriptive top-down, mitigation-centric approaches or an enabling environment to attract investment and profit opportunities for multinational corporations and financial institutions, especially from the North.

Either the JTWP fulfils its promise of delivering concrete outcomes for developed countries more vulnerable to the climate crisis and especially real people suffering both intensifying climate change impacts and unjust transitions, or it becomes another failed workstream further obstructing a sufficient international response to the climate crisis.

Key issues 

  • JTWP should focus on operationalisation of Common but Differentiated Responsibility and Respective Capability (CBDR-RC) on all elements (a broader scope – not mitigation and energy centric and not only labour-focused) but enable just transition pathways for the full implementation of the goals of the Paris Agreement.
  • JTWP should not be seen as another platform to push for prescriptive top-down mitigation-centric approaches or creating enabling environments to attract investments for the global north private sector actors; instead, it should consider the needs of the vulnerable groups and prioritise community led solutions (that are co-created by and benefit workers in both the formal and informal sector, communities, small and medium enterprises, as well as developing countries). 
  • A JT must include agriculture as 4 billion people, who are already disproportionately experiencing the effects of climate change, depend on the sector. We need a JT towards equitable, humane and agroecological food systems that will support both adaptation and mitigation goals.
  • Just Transition cannot and must not be reduced to a scheme designed to uphold existing inequities and to appease markets and investors. This is a betrayal of the millions of workers, farmers, Indigenous Peoples, and communities whose survival depends on a radical and comprehensive transformation of existing systems. 

… 

  1. Adaptation 

This year is very significant for adaptation related items. There are five agenda items under adaptation: (i) GGA, (ii) National Adaptation Plans (NAPs), (iii) the Nairobi work programme, (iv) review of the Adaptation Committee and (v) guidance relating to Adaptation Communications.

At COP 29 in Baku, by decision 3/CMA.6,  there were some gains made with a substantive outcome under the GGA, in particular, to have the GGA as a “standing agenda item”, with the adoption of the ‘Baku Adaptation Roadmap’ to advance the GGA work under the ‘UAE Framework for Global Climate Resilience’; and the inclusion of “means of implementation” in the UAE-Belem work programme on the development of indicators, for measuring progress achieved towards the GGA’s seven thematic and four dimensional targets. These were key demands by developing countries. (The GGA thematic targets cover water, food and agriculture, health, ecosystems and biodiversity, infrastructure and human settlements, poverty eradication and livelihoods and protection of cultural heritage, while the dimensional targets are (i) impact, vulnerability and risk assessment, (ii) planning, (iii) implementation and (iv) monitoring, evaluation and learning. )

However, huge gaps remained on the rest of the adaptation agenda items, especially on the very important issue of NAPs, with only a procedural decision to continue further work at SB 62. The NAPs agenda has seen a history of stalled negotiations due to fundamental divergences between developing and developed countries over anchoring means of implementation in the decision, consistently blocked by developed countries led by the US. 

  1. Anchoring Article 9.1 in the Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3 T and rejection of attempts to transfer responsibility of climate finance delivery from rich governments to the private sector and multilateral institutions

The Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3T was established at COP29 as a year-long process to look at how the $1.3 trillion goal agreed at COP29 within the NCQG process should be reached. It will produce a report summarising the outcomes by COP30. It is a key demand of Global South countries and movements that Article 9.1 of the UNFCCC be anchored in this process to reinforce the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDR-RC), a core concept of the UNFCCC. Additionally, after the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) debacle in Baku last year, the Global North is set to orchestrate a co-opt of the Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3 Trillion by pushing for transferring responsibility of climate finance delivery from rich governments to the private sector and multilateral institutions (eg. World Bank) and further undermine the UNFCCC. This must be resisted at all costs. The Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3 Trillion is not a treasure hunt for the private sector. 

Key demands 

  • Climate finance outcomes of Baku to Belém Roadmap to $1.3 Trillion in line with climate justice
  • Urgent delivery of climate finance obligations in the trillions from Global North – past and present
  • Clear implementation and timeline on the tripling of climate finance flows to UNFCCC climate funds
  • Scaled up commitments and delivery of pledges to Fund for Responding to Loss & Damage (FrLD) and Adaptation fund 
  • Adequate financing for just and equitable transition out of fossil fuels and into renewable energy
  • Finance climate-resilient food systems and ensure the right to food and food sovereignty. 

Key Climate Finance figures

The Global South demands: 

  • Climate Finance: $5 Trillion in public grants. 
  • Adaptation Finance: $2 Trillion for energy transformation and $1 Trillion for food systems transformation. 
  • Loss and Damage: $1 Trillion for Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage. 

…

  1. Promoting false solutions under the cover of the Global Stocktake (GST)

From carbon capture and utilisation and storage (CCUS) to carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and low-carbon hydrogen production, the Global North is pushing a set of false solutions under the cover of the Global Stocktake (GST) outcome from COP28. These technofixes are not solutions—they are lifelines for fossil fuel expansion and tools for delaying real solutions.

Key demands 

  • Carbon markets are not, and should not be considered, climate finance;
  • Climate finance should not be spent on false solutions, including CCS, CDR etc;
  • We need to close the false solutions/abatement loopholes in any reiteration of the GST outcome.
  • Investment in real solutions that are grounded in people’s sovereignty and ecological justice, not colonial logics and market mechanisms.

…  

  1. Global  South debt crisis and unjust debt architecture addressed within the Sharm el-Sheikh Dialogue on Article 2.1c

Public finance is urgently needed to address the intensifying climate crisis due to the Global North’s historical and continuing occupation of the world’s commons and failure to execute ambitious climate action and deliver on climate finance obligations. Yet, the Global North continues to silence the clamor for the cancellation of public, illegitimate debts that Global South are being forced to repay.

Key demands 

  • Climate finance must be grant-based, public and adequate so countries are not forced into debt
  • To align all financial flows with the climate emergency, we must address the Global South debt crisis. This means debt cancellation for all countries, across all creditors, free from economic conditions. We also need urgent reform to the debt architecture via a UN framework convention on sovereign debt, including a multilateral debt workout mechanism. 
  • No to false finance solutions that are inadequate (like climate resilient debt clauses), or that can exacerbate the current situation (e.g. debt swaps, more climate finance as loans, green and blue bonds, and MDBs playing a bigger role in climate finance delivery)

…

  1. Negotiations and updates on the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), Global Goals on Adaptation and Just Transition Work Program for  food systems transformation. 

Key demands 

  • Ensure climate action and food systems transformation are properly addressed in more ambitious Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) in 2025 starting with the JT package to include agriculture and a recognition of the need to urgently transition away from industrial agricultural production towards equitable, humane and agroecological agricultural food system as an effective adaptation and mitigation measure to equitably reduce deforestation and tackle emission to meet the 1.5°C climate target.
  • Climate financing for smallholders and an equitable just transition towards humane, sustainable, and agroecological agricultural practices and agroecology
    1. Demand sufficient and adequate provision of climate finance from the Green Climate Fund (GCF), Loss and Damage Finance (LDF), and Adaptation Fund (AF) for climate action on agriculture & fisheries and agroecology.  

2. Redirect finance and perverse subsidies from false solutions in big ag and big livestock to real solutions in agriculture, including agroecology and agroforestry, local consumption and production, gender justice in the food systems and support to small holders.  

…

  1. GST outcome on Fast, Fair, Funded, Forever Phase Out from Fossil Fuel. 

The GST outcome (COP28) promotes problematic technologies like ‘abatement and removal technologies such as carbon capture and utilisation and storage, particularly in hard-to-abate sectors, and low-carbon hydrogen production’ – that risk extending fossil fuel use and enabling further expansion. 

Key demands

  • Fast, funded, fair, forever phase out. 
  • #DontGasAsia #DontGasAfrica 
  • If calls for fossil fuel phase out need to refer to the GST outcome (from COP28) then they should lift up the specific FF/energy elements of the GST rather than calls for reiteration of para 28 or ‘full GST implementation’ (as these explicitly encourage false solutions). 
  1. Technology Implementation Program (TIP) 

Countries will decide on the way forward for implementing the TIP. Technology is a key pillar of means of implementation support that developed countries have to provide to developing countries under the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement. We stress that the TIP must be implemented in line with the principles of CBDR-RC and equity.  

Key demands:

  • Technology transfer from developed to developing countries must occur. 
  • Sustainable and adequate access to financial resources is key in addressing technology needs of developing countries. Finance must be provided to implement technology needs and priorities identified by developing countries in their Technology Needs and Assessment, Technology Action Plans, Biennial Transparency Reports, National Communications, and Long term strategies.
  • Barriers posed by the international intellectual property rights regime must be addressed so that developing countries. 

Press Releases

End the Siege, End the Genocide: No Climate Justice Under Occupation

For Immediate Release

Media advisory

WHEN Protest timings: June 16th, 8:00 AM (GMT+2)

Press conference timings: June 16th, 10 AM (GMT+2) 

WHERE Protest venue: World Conference Center Entrance (Metro stop: Heussallee/Museumsmeile). Press conference venue: Nairobi 4, Main building. conference in Nairobi room inside the World Conference Center

**Photo and interview opportunity**

CONTACT

  1. Esthappen S, Communications Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (Whatsapp: +91 9820918910, Email: [email protected])

WHAT: A peaceful protest where local movements, Palestinian activists, international  social and climate justice groups and constituencies from around the world unite to express deep outrage about the ongoing genocide in Palestine. As Israel continues its brutal campaign of bombing, massacres and starvation against an innocent civilian population, many of the actors and states that are directly enabling crimes are currently walking the halls of the UN climate negotiations with no accountability. People from around the world are joining forces to remind them of the deep interlinkages between the intersecting crises of climate, capitalism, colonialism, militarism, violence and genocide. And that they cannot separate climate justice and the cause of Palestinian liberation. The protest will be followed by a press conference in the June Climate Meetings (SB 62) Nairobi press conference room.   

WHO Protest: Civil society groups (from across Germany and the world) and members of UNFCCC rights-based constituencies. Press conference: Mohammed Usrof (Palestine Institute for Climate Strategy), Fatma Khafagy (Women and Gender Constituency), Amiera Sawas (Climate Action Network), Hajar Al-Beltaji (ANGRY), Ana Sánchez (Global Energy Embargo for Palestine), Moderated by Rachitaa Gupta (Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice).    

VISUALS Big crowds of people from around the world with everyone wearing RED clothes and KEFFIYEHS holding banners and placards with messages of solidarity and expressing rage at the complicity of governments attending the climate negotiations with a “business as usual” mindset Coordinated movements and sloganeering    

SPOKESPEOPLE Representatives from Palestinian civil society groups and climate and social justice activists from around the world including local civil society organisations across Germany. 

RESOURCES 1. List of demands from Palestinian COP30 Coalition. 2. Photo/video library. 3. Press release on the protest and press conference. 4. Quote sheet.  5. Recording of press conference.  

Statements

Statement: Global South stands united against attempts by the Global North to derail the Financing for Development (FfD4) process and escape from historical responsibility. 

At a time when public finance is desperately needed to address the intensification of the climate crises due to Global North’s historical and continuing occupation of the world’s commons and failure to execute ambitious climate actions and deliver on climate finance obligations, the Global North continues to fraud the Global South of the climate debt owed, this time co-opting the Fourth Financing for Development (FfD4) process after Baku last year, to further realise their ‘Great Escape’ from provision of new and additional climate finance to developing countries.   

The refusal to respond to the clamor for the cancellation of public debts in the Global South and the attempt to bury climate finance in a single paragraph alongside biodiversity and ecosystems in the zero draft which was opposed by developing countries, is a calculated move by Global North governments to weaken respective mandates and cover up double and multiple counting of the same funds. 

Additionally, their failure to acknowledge “new and additional” obligations and push for insertion of deceptive language of “all sources” along with twisting voluntary South-South cooperation marks the next phase of the Global North’s dereliction of legal obligations. All this while they continue pouring trillions into fossil fuels, militarisation, and corporate bailouts—the very systems driving planetary destruction.

The FfD4 Conference (June 30th-July 3rd) taking place at the heels of June Climate Meetings (SB62) is a crucial moment for Global South governments and movements to hold the leaders of the richest, industrialised nations accountable and stop their schemes to push debt traps, market-based mechanisms and recycled loans and efforts to erase their historical responsibility and cover up for their failures.

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) along with its members rejects the attempts by the Global North to rob the communities in the Global South—least responsible for the climate crises—and stands with the G77 that is united in their fight to defend the integrity of climate finance bound by legal obligations of the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement. We also stand against the decision to conduct the next phase of negotiations behind closed doors with no civil society observers being allowed and demand transparency and accountability from the United Nations. 

. 

G7 LEADERS, PAY UP & PROVIDE CLIMATE FINANCE NOW! 

#TrillionsNotMillions #PayUp #ClimateJusticeNow 

COP29, News

COP29 delivers death sentence for millions amidst “stage managed” Global North takedown of trust, collaboration, and protocol.

The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ)

For Immediate Release

COP29 delivers death sentence for millions amidst “stage managed” Global North takedown of trust, collaboration, and protocol

BAKU, AZERBAIJAN, 24 NOV 24 –  COP29 has been less of a COP and more of a carefully manipulated cop-out by Global North governments that have used the Baku climate talks to sideline the core principles of a party-driven process to finalise their decades-long Great Escape and to rip apart the UNFCCC and Paris Agreement, lighting fire to a just global response to the climate crisis.

For the past two weeks, the Baku stadium has become a place of unprecedented broken trust, departure from established precedent, empty promises, and political bullying where Global North governments– led by the United States, European Union and United Kingdom– have bullied their way out of moral and legal responsibility for addressing the climate crisis and paying their climate debt. This escapist agenda has been enabled by a UNFCCC and COP29 presidency that has repeatedly departed from established protocol on multiple occasions to pave the way for this agenda, including in the closing plenary where the decision on the New Collective Quantified Goal on Finance (NCQG) was gavelled through by the presidency, and celebrated by the Executive Secretary, without consensus by Parties and multiple governments objecting. 

When so much is on the line, COP29 has forced through a deal that condemns those across the Global South, withholding the finance, collaboration, and technology needed to prevent a total climate collapse. These Global North governments have made it clear that they have no intention of being partners in global climate action, as communities across the Global South and the world grapple with a deadly and devastating crisis that is wreaking havoc on billions of lives around the world. 

When so many lives are at stake, no deal is better than a bad deal, which is why DCJ adamantly rejects this deal, alongside multiple Global South governments that have also rejected the deal–including Cuba, India, Bolivia, and Nigeria. The outcomes of COP29–which include rules that will scale up risky and ineffective carbon markets on one hand, and massively underdelivering on the Global North’s climate debt on the other– are not even close to delivering the public climate finance and real solutions owed to the Global South by the Global North. We will not back down from demanding the climate justice, real solutions, and the public climate finance we need to achieve a just and equitable transition off fossil fuels. 

COP29 has failed to take into account our lived realities, and has weighed our lives and livelihoods as wanting and unnecessary, instead pushing our communities into further devastation by offering only false solutions like debt swaps, carbon markets, loans and green bonds.

The NCQG decision that was adopted by the presidency without any opportunity for parties to stop the decision:

  1. is too far from the needs of developing countries as calculated in numerous surveys to be in the trillions, offering only $300 billion with no guarantee of any public provision of funding that does not put Global South countries into deeper debt.
  2. excludes Loss and Damage in the goal, a glaring oversight.
  3. backs the US-led argument that the finance should come not from the governments responsible for the climate crisis, but from development banks and private investors, thereby, allowing developed countries to exit their obligations to provide finance.

DCJ, cannot and will not accept today’s outcome at Baku, which has failed the world, particularly communities in the Global South. The days of climate impunity and climate obstruction must end. Climate justice now!

Quotes by DCJ members

“The outcome of COP29 is an outrageous insult to the people of the Global South. The pennies that have been thrown our way not only fall short of the trillions we are owed, this paltry amount will be delivered in the form of private finance and loans that will deepen the debts of already impoverished countries. COP29 will always be remembered as the COP where Global North governments permanently exited from their climate finance obligations, with the United States leading the way. From killing the Kyoto Protocol in 2012 to now selling out the Global South to the private sector, the US has always been the biggest blocker of climate action. By protecting their own interests and sabotaging COP29, the US and the rest of the Global North have condemned the world to climate catastrophe.” Lidy Nacpil, Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development

“The finalisation of the COP29 outcome was through a process that was unfair as the decision was gavelled without hearing objections from the parties. Developed countries once again escaped their obligations to commit to the provision of significant public resources to developing countries. They agreed only to mobilise financial resources without a firm commitment on what quantum they will provide in climate finance. They were wrangling with developing countries, behaving as if they were in a fish market, haggling over what they can offer, without a clear finance commitment. They expect developing countries to show greater ambition on mitigation and adaptation without the commensurate ambition on finance. This is not just a joke but a serious insult to developing countries, as they pretend with slogans to keep the 1.5 degree C alive, abdicating their responsibilities under the Paris Agreement and risking lives of the poor and wrecking the planet. “ Meena Raman, Third World Network 

“The forced gavelling of a sham COP29 decision over the fierce opposition of developing countries is nothing short of an authoritarian insult to the principles of equity and justice enshrined in the climate process, convention, and the Paris Agreement. This decision, imposed without consensus, denies the Global South the climate finance needed for urgent climate action. Finance is not charity—it is reparations for the historical emissions and continued exploitation by developed nations.

The trillions we demand are essential to address the climate induced destruction. Yet, instead of honouring their obligations, wealthy nations have pushed a fraudulent outcome built on inadequate pledges, speculative private funds, and the unconscionable idea of making the Global South pay for a crisis it did not cause.

We the Global South categorically reject this illegitimate outcome. We will not accept the erasure of equity, nor will we allow the historical responsibility of polluters to be diluted under the guise of voluntary commitments and privatised finance. Our nations may have been sidelined in the COP halls, but we will carry this fight into every space, every movement, and every avenue for climate justice. This is not an end—it is the start of a stronger, unified resistance against climate colonialism and for the survival and dignity of our people.” Rachitaa Gupta, Global Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

“It is infuriating to hear rich countries claim there is no money to repay the climate debt owed to the South whilst pouring billions into the genocide in Palestine. More than empty promises and expressions of solidarity, we need accountability and action to deliver both climate justice and justice for Palestinians.” Abeer Butmeh, PENGON / Friends of the Earth Palestine

“Without sufficient financial commitment from developed countries, we guarantee the disappearance of South American forests, the degradation of our key ecosystems to sustain the climate balance. In other words, we condemn the Paris Agreement to failure and the NDCs to non-compliance. COP29 leaves a void that will be very difficult to overcome at COP30 in Brazil.” Antonio Zambrano Allende, Movimiento Ciudadano frente al Cambio Climático – MOCICC/Perú

“The UK and other Global North countries have bullied, stalled, manipulated & now stage managed the outcome of  the UN Climate Summit COP29, to try to escape their responsibility for causing the climate crisis. Rich countries have ignored the combined call from climate justice groups and Global South countries to bulldoze through this unjust deal. $300 billion is inadequate—it’s nowhere near enough to cut emissions fast enough, adapt to the impacts of climate breakdown, or support Global South countries in growing cleanly. It’s not the public finance needed. The message now is clear: only by building our collective power as people can we deliver a just and equitable transition to a future where everyone can live with dignity, in harmony with the planet.” Asad Rehman, War on Want

“We came here at COP29 to serve an invoice to the global North for the long overdue climate debt they owe to the global South but what we got instead are false solutions. Not only are rich polluters refusing to pay up; they are also seeking to profit off of the sufferings of impacted communities by peddling loans, carbon markets, green bonds, debt swaps, and other market-based distractions that turn the obligatory character of the climate finance we demand around. What was dubbed to be a finance COP has been exposed to be a false-solutions COP, swarmed with fossil fuel lobbyists, subverted by rich polluters, rigged to fail. The fight for accountability, reparations, and climate justice continues as we exit COP29 and go back to our communities.” Ivan Enrile, Climate Justice Programme Lead, IBON International

“Once again, in Baku, the climate negotiations reflect the core of the capitalist and colonialist model that is at the root of the planetary crisis. Rich countries, which for centuries have violated the territories of the global South, and have caused serious losses and damages due to climate change, refuse to commit financing to face the crisis and impose false solutions that increase the vulnerability and dependence of our countries.” Eduardo Giesen, DCJ Regional Coordinator, Latin America and the Caribbean 

“At COP29, developed nations once again coerced developing countries into accepting a financial deal woefully inadequate to address the gravity of our global climate crisis. The deal fails to provide the critical support required for developing countries to transition swiftly from fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy systems, or to prepare for the devastating impacts of the climate crisis, leaving them severely under-resourced. The outcome offers false hope to those already bearing the brunt of climate disasters and abandons vulnerable communities and nations, leaving them to face these immense challenges alone. We must persist in our fight, demanding a significant increase in financing and holding developed countries to account for delivering real, impactful actions.” Harjeet Singh, Global Engagement Director, Fossil Fuel Treaty Initiative

“Blame Baku’s disastrous deal on US bullying with its “my way, or the highway” brand of climate diplomacy. US State Department officials demanded more mitigation from developing countries but refused to deliver any financing developing countries are requesting, all while expanding its own fossil fuels production to set a world record for oil output. US attempts to diminish their legal obligations to provide finance proved successful, leaving a shameful legacy of global climate injustice by the Biden Presidency. As champions of their own rules-based-order, what we saw was, “We make the rules, so follow our orders,” where the US flouts the rules when it suits them.”  But the world wouldn’t fall for it in Baku since the injustices imposed by climate change are so severe, with many, many countries vociferously opposing the gaveling through of the decision. Victor Menotti, US Coordinator, Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice

“The supposed ‘COP of climate finance’ has turned into the ‘COP of false solutions’. The same rich countries that have been pouring billions into the genocide in Gaza, shirked their historical responsibilities at COP29 with a terrible deal that destroys the notion of equity, provides only pennies to the Global South, and pushes private debt creating finance. This is an insult to developing countries and the climate debt that they are owed. Further, the one thing that COP29 did achieve is the operationalisation of fraudulent, failed, and harmful carbon markets, continuing to provide a get out of jail free card to Big Polluters whilst devastating communities and ecosystems around the world.” Lise Masson, Friends of the Earth International

“COP29 delivered not climate action, not climate debt, not climate justice, but a climate crisis on steroids. Ramping up carbon markets— which do not reduce emissions—and offering way too little public climate finance far too late means the legacy of COP29 will still be millions of lives that never needed to be lost. Global North governments like the United States, European Union, and United Kingdom will deploy their manipulative PR machines to celebrate themselves and blame others for kicking the can down the road, but these are the world’s largest historical polluters with the deepest fossil-fueled pockets, and they are the ones who are to blame. These governments will continue to spend trillions on the war machines that fuel genocide in Palestine and violence around the world, while coming to Baku offering nothing but bad deals that are worse than no deals. COP29 was a COP for and by Big Polluters–look no further than the nearly 1800 fossil fuel lobbyists that infiltrated these talks in Baku. We will not be silent while inaction continues to condemn people and the planet. We need real solutions, Real Zero, real climate finance–now.” Rachel Rose Jackson, Corporate Accountability

“Rich countries have completely failed to make a credible offer to pay up on climate finance: pull back the layers of proposals and it’s a recipe for spiralling debt and deepening destruction in the global south. Today’s outcome is a damning indictment of the rich world’s priorities. This must be a wake-up call. Rich governments including the UK must take their role in finding innovative forms of finance seriously. That means taking on the fossil fuel industry and the super-rich through permanent polluters’ taxes and wealth taxes, not leaving it to financial engineering in the City of London. Power and resources must be shifted from the corporations profiting at our collective expense to countries in the global south, suffering the worst impacts of a problem they have done the least to cause.” Izzie McIntosh, Climate Campaign Manager, Global Justice Now

“The COP29 finance package is a glaring example of misplaced priorities and broken promises. The entire process has been deeply flawed—excluding key voices, disregarding historical emissions and sidelining the principles of equity and justice. Once again, world leaders have failed to step up, choosing to ignore the urgent need for transformative funding. While $2.6 trillion continues to support harmful subsidies that drive pollution, deforestation and fossil fuel expansion, an opportunity to redirect these resources to the very communities that sustain our planet’s biodiversity and resilience has been squandered. These frontline communities, who hold the key to our planet’s survival, are left behind, while destructive industries like factory farming are allowed to flourish. Kelly Dent, Director of External Engagement & Media, World Animal Protection 

“Colonial thinking and a desire to continue business-as-usual from developed countries has dominated this COP, with vulnerable countries forced once again to fight for their lives and ultimately be ignored. Rich countries, who hold the responsibility for the climate crisis, have failed to deliver the finance needed to support communities facing the worst impacts. They should be ashamed of their greed, as it has once again led to a failed COP.” Dylan Hamilton, Alliance of Non-Governmental Radical Youth (ANGRY)

“The $300 billion climate finance offer at Baku is a scam — nowhere near what’s needed and not debt-free. Rich countries  are planning for fossil fuel phaseout failure and dodging responsibilities by forcing developing countries and the private sector to cover the bill. This creates a debt trap for those most vulnerable to the climate crisis. If rich countries put their hoarded trillions on the table instead of making excuses, we’d see real progress on fossil fuel phase-out. The US, EU, and UK show sickening indifference while millions pay with their lives. We will not give up.” Laurie van der Burg, Oil Change International Global Public Finance Manager

“COP29 got off to a very bad start by perpetuating the colonial model and human rights violations, and by opening the floodgates to geoengineering through the adoption of Article 6.4 on carbon markets. Unfortunately, it has ended as badly as it began; the lack of ambition and finance by developed countries and the promotion of false solutions to address climate change will be mostly suffered by those who have contributed the least to this crisis” Coraina de la Plaza, Global Coordinator, Hands Off Mother Earth Alliance

Quotes in Spanish:

“Una vez más, en Bakú, las negociaciones climáticas reflejan el fondo del modelo capitalista y colonialista que está en el origen de la crisis planetaria. Los países ricos, que por siglos han vulnerado los territorios del Sur global, y han provocado graves pérdidas y daños por el cambio climático, se niegan a comprometer el financiamiento para enfrentar la crisis e imponen falsas soluciones que aumentan la vulnerabilidad y dependencia de nuestros países. “ Eduardo Giesen, coordinador regional de DCJ para Latinoamérica y el Caribe 

Contact Us: 

Esthappen S, DCJ, +91-9820918910, [email protected], 

Julian, DCJ, +306941437285, [email protected]

X: @gcdcj 

COP29, Interventions

Intervention: TUNGO, WGC, ENGO (CAN & DCJ), YOUNGO to the Presidency on the Just Transition Work Program

Our constituencies have intensively exchanged with many of you for the past two weeks – We have heard your commitment to land this work in a good, ambitious place. We hope you find more time to engage constructively on this draft. We also would like to convey a message to the presidency: the JTWP needs consensus to be successful, so we would very much like to avoid a take it or leave it approach. 

Parties should consider what kind of message that failing to deliver a strong Just Transition decision at this COP will send. It would send a message to workers, people and communities across the world – who are relying on their governments to deliver a bold transformation to a better world – that their governments are, in fact, not willing to see action on this vital issue. 

Our priority remains paragraph 8

Our priority is ensuring that paragraph 8 remains in the text as it gives the political signal that we want concrete outcomes out of the Just Transition Work Programme. The compilation of a list of actions that governments should undertake together to advance just transition is a way to ensure progress towards such outcomes.  

Ensuring our inclusion in the development of the just transition guidance framework

We support paragraph 9 and would like to propose a pathway for the creation of a just transition guidance framework that ensures the inclusion of stakeholders, starting with the development of the terms of reference (TOR) (e.g. an ad-hoc expert committee as mentioned by LDCs, where observer constituencies are represented, drafts the TOR by SB62)

We want to retain references to social protection and to the informal sector and the care economy. We believe that the inclusion of such language in the final decision text would constitute a big win from this COP. We therefore urge Parties to retain paragraph 18.

Other elements that we like and that should remain/be added in the text

Addition of stakeholders to paragraph 14

Paragraph 14: We welcome the language of social dialogue, however this must also reflect the ILO dimension, meaning that it must include other stakeholders missing in the draft text. 

“14. Further highlights the importance of ensuring meaningful and effective social dialogue involving all relevant social partners, including with workers affected by a just transition, informal workers, and stakeholder participation with people in vulnerable situations, Indigenous Peoples, local communities, migrants and internally displaced …”

Retention of important language 

Paragraph 13: We appreciate the inclusive approach of paragraph 13 on human rights, Indigenous Peoples rights, labour rights, gender equality. 

We emphasise that all the rights mentioned in para 13 need to be kept in the text including right to development and right to a health and clean environment, both agreed internationally. 

The emphasis on international cooperation and consideration of the role of social protection, and the importance of the JTWP covering the informal sector and the care economy as essential to a just transition is anotherare  is another potential big wins. 

Paragraph 18: In addition, we welcome the inclusion of intergenerational equity as one crucial type of justice in paragraph 18. 

We want to retain references to social protection and to the informal sector and the care economy. We believe that the inclusion of such language in the final decision text would constitute a big win from this COP. We therefore urge Parties to retain paragraph 18.

We want to retain references to social protection and to the informal sector and the care economy. We believe that the inclusion of such language in the final decision text would constitute a big win from this COP. We therefore urge Parties to retain paragraph 18.

We strongly support those elements and we want to see them retained. 

, 

COP29, Interventions, Press Releases

False Solutions and deceptive victories on the rise: Carbon markets are not climate finance!

MEDIA ADVISORY: Nov 13th, 2024

COP29 Press Conference – The Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice (DCJ) 

The opening day of COP29 saw the undemocratic gavelling through of carbon markets, once again enshrining the interests of Big Polluters over people. Carbon markets are not climate finance; they are a gift to the fossil fuel industry to continue polluting while leaving the door wide open for rampant proliferation of dangerous and unscientific false solutions such as geoengineering, ‘offsetting’ and carbon capture. 

Rich countries and big polluting industries continue to funnel money in to wars, genocide and “fixes” that will allow them to keep their extractive economic systems going without delivering on the urgent climate finance for the Global South countries. These schemes only perpetuate neocolonial patterns of extractivism, with Global South and Indigenous communities first and foremost impacted.  

Join us as members of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice spotlight the polluters’ attempt to derail climate action. 

When: Wednesday 13th November | 12:30pm-1:00pm (Baku)

Where: Press Conference – Natavan, Area D / WATCH LIVE

Who:

  • Tatiana Rodríguez Maldonado,  CENSAT Agua Viva / Friends of the Earth Colombia
  • Tom Goldtooth, Indigenous Environment Network
  • Dylan Hamilton, Alliance of Non-Governmental Radical Youth
  • Rachel Rose Jackson, Corporate Accountability

Contact Us

Julian, DCJ, +306941437285, [email protected]