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COP26 Glasgow climate summit at risk of failure, UN chief warns
- COP26, the UN Climate Change Conference, will be held in Glasgow from October 31 to November 12
- UN chief Antonio Guterres says ‘mistrust’ between developed and developing countries needs to be overcome
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United Nations chief Antonio Guterres said a critical meeting on climate change later this year in Scotland is at risk of failure due to mistrust between developed and developing countries and a lack of ambitious goals among some emerging economies.
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The UN COP26 conference in Glasgow aims to wring much more ambitious climate action and the money to go with it from participants around the globe. Scientists said last month that global warming is dangerously close to spiralling out of control.
“I believe that we are at risk of not having a success in COP26,” Guterres said in an interview at UN headquarters in New York. “There is still a level of mistrust, between north and south, developed and developing countries, that needs to be overcome.”
“We are on the verge of the abyss and when you are on the verge of the abyss, you need to be very careful about what the next step is. And the next step is COP26 in Glasgow,” he said.
Guterres and Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson will on Monday host a meeting of world leaders on the sidelines of the annual high-level week of the UN General Assembly in a bid to build the chances of success at the climate conference, being held from October 31 to November 12.
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