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Opinion | Why Joe Biden’s criticism of Xi Jinping’s COP26 no-show is out of line
- Given the pandemic, it’s reasonable for leaders to think carefully about international travel
- More importantly, summits such as the UN climate event, which require thousands of people to fly in, are hardly environmentally friendly
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One of the few silver linings to the Covid-19 cloud is the discovery that a great deal of business travel is unnecessary, as is the daily commute for many workers. The sight of world leaders jetting around the globe to stay at top-end resorts with huge delegations in tow was once considered normal, but is it really necessary?
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That’s not to say face-to-face talks don’t have a role to play, but shouldn’t they be kept to a minimum, if not for the pandemic, then in the spirit of stemming climate change?
This year’s United Nations’ Conference of the Parties, better known as COP26, is being held in Glasgow, featuring some 21,000 attendees, including thousands of diplomats and over a 100 national leaders.
Do the energy-hungry logistics of the event bring the world any closer to keeping the rise in average temperatures to less than 1.5 degrees Celsius?
Consider, for example, US President Joe Biden’s motorcade, consisting of over 20 vehicles. These were not energy efficient models, but old-fashioned luxury limousines and gas-guzzling SUVs.
This extraordinary motorcade, put in place to move one man from Air Force One to various venues and back, was pared down from the president’s 85-vehicle motorcade when he visited Pope Francis in the Vatican.
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