Sunak: More needed to tackle climate change
THE Prime Minister has said that “more must be done” to tackle climate change, after negotiators secured a last-minute deal at Cop27 in Egypt.
Rishi Sunak, who attended the global climate summit earlier this month in Egypt after originally deciding not to attend, said in a brief statement: “I welcome the progress made at Cop27, but there can be no time for complacency.
“Keeping the 1.5 degrees commitment alive is vital to the future of our planet.
“More must be done.”
The slogan of “keeping 1.5 alive” dominated discussions at the summit in Glasgow last year, when Cop26 President Alok Sharma and the UK delegation steered efforts to limit global warming.
Yesterday, Mr Sharma expressed disappointment about elements of the agreement as he warned that the 1.5C ambition is “on life support”.
Speaking at the summit’s closing plenary session, he said that progress on loss and damage has been “historic” but warned that it was not a moment for “unqualified celebration”.
Officials and negotiators agreed a deal in the early hours of Sunday to create a fund for compensating poor nations that are victims of extreme weather worsened by rich countries’ carbon pollution.
It is a big win for poorer nations which have long called for cash because they are often the victims of climate worsened floods, droughts, heat waves, famines and storms despite having contributed little to the pollution that heats up the globe.
But Mr Sharma told the conference: “Many of us came here to safeguard the outcomes that we secured in Glasgow, and to go further still.
“In our attempts to do that, we have had a series of very challenging conversations over the past few days.
“Indeed those of us who came to Egypt to keep 1.5 degrees alive, and to respect what every single one of us agreed to in Glasgow, have had to fight relentlessly to hold the line.
“We have had to battle to build on one of the key achievements of Glasgow.”