PARIS: A key meeting ahead of the UN COP29 climate summit ended Friday in frustration with countries making little progress over how to fund a new finance deal for poorer nations.
Delegates were urged to put aside differences and move negotiations forward during the two-day “pre-COP” in Azerbaijan, which is hosting the major climate talks in November.
Not all countries were represented so smaller gains, rather than concrete breakthroughs, were hoped for during the Baku meet.
But the gathering wrapped with nations no closer to resolving the same sticking points that have hindered the talks for months, attendees told AFP.
“Despite some hopeful talk of coming together, countries remain quite far apart,” said Iskander Erzini Vernoit, co-founder and director at the IMAL Initiative for Climate and Development, who was present in Baku.
At COP29, countries are supposed to agree on a new goal for “climate finance” that meets the needs of the world’s poorest countries in dealing with global warming.
The existing amount of $100 billion a year is considered insufficient and rich countries are under pressure to raise their contributions by at least a factor of 10.
Donors have still not said how much they are willing to pay, frustrating those advocating for a larger financial commitment from the countries most responsible for climate change to date.
“It is outrageous that just weeks before COP29, developed countries did not say how much money they are willing provide for this new finance goal,” said Mariana Paoli from Christian Aid.
Some developed countries want the pact to offer mixed layers of finance: one from governments, another from multilateral lenders, and private capital.
But Paoli said without developed countries agreeing to pay from their coffers without strings attached “any number at COP will be a meaningless figure.”
Most climate finance comes as loans, and developing countries say it worsens their debt problems.
They are pushing for unconditional grants to finance clean energy and climate adaptation measures, and want funding for disaster relief known as “loss and damage” included in any new deal.
Rebecca Thiessen from the NGO coalition CAN said it was “positive” to hear rich nations at Baku talk of a pact in trillions instead of billions.
“The scale of need has been recognized, but no figure has been put on the table,” she said.
Little progress at key meet ahead of COP29 climate summit
https://arab.news/vt2xd
Little progress at key meet ahead of COP29 climate summit
- Delegates were urged to put aside differences and move negotiations forward during the two-day “pre-COP” in Azerbaijan
- At COP29, countries are supposed to agree on a new goal for “climate finance” that meets the needs of the world’s poorest countries in dealing with global warming
Emir of Qatar to visit UK in December, Buckingham Palace announces
- State visit highlights growing partnership between nations in sectors such as education, business, energy
LONDON: King Charles will host the Emir of Qatar and his wife during a state visit to the UK on Dec. 3-4, Buckingham Palace announced on Friday.
Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani and his wife, Sheikha Jawaher, will stay at the palace in central London during their visit, The Times newspaper reported.
Sheikh Tamim, who became Qatar’s emir in 2013, is known for his strong ties to the UK, having attended Sherborne School and Sandhurst.
The state visit highlights a growing partnership between the two nations, particularly in sectors such as education, business, and energy.
Sheikh Tamim and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer met during the Paris Olympic Games this summer, and also met previously in Qatar.
King Charles visited Qatar several times when he was Prince of Wales, and Sheikh Tamim attended his coronation last year.
Their most recent meeting took place during the COP28 summit in Dubai in November and December last year.
ECHR ruling for Cyprus asylum-seekers a ‘perfect win’ for human rights, say lawyers
- The ECHR on Tuesday condemned Nicosia for returning two Syrian refugees to Lebanon who had arrived on a small boat
LONDON: Human rights lawyers on Friday were celebrating a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights for Cyprus to pay damages to two Syrian refugees who were blocked from applying for asylum as a major victory.
The ECHR on Tuesday condemned Nicosia for returning two Syrian refugees to Lebanon who had arrived on a small boat, without examining their asylum claim, and said the country had committed four violations of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Cyprus failed to conduct “any assessment of the risk of lack of access to an effective asylum process in Lebanon or the living conditions of asylum-seekers there,” it also said, adding that the Cypriot government had not assessed the risk of “refoulement,” which is the forcible return of refugees to a country such as Syria where they might be subjected to persecution.
Lawyer Nicoletta Charalambidou, who represented the refugees, said the judgment set a precedent against Cyprus’ migration policies, The Guardian newspaper reported on Friday.
“For four years the migration policies of Cyprus have relied on human rights violations, and illegal pushbacks at land and sea,” she said.
“This ruling has exposed these illegal practices and it has set a precedent. It is a perfect win for human rights,” she added.
Charalambidou stated that more legal actions are likely to follow, as asylum-seekers seek justice for violations of their rights under EU and international law.
“There are many more that I will be filing here in Nicosia before the administrative court of international protection and of course this week’s judgment (in Strasbourg) will encourage others,” she said.
“At first we saw pushbacks in the sea, now we’re seeing pushbacks in the buffer zone but Cyprus has obligations. It has to provide access to asylum requests wherever they come from and it has to provide dignified reception conditions. It is duty bound to do that under EU and international law.”
The ruling came amid reports by the UN’s refugee agency and the Border Violence Monitoring Network highlighting Cyprus’ use of new surveillance technologies and forcible expulsions, particularly in the buffer zone.
Around 65 asylum-seekers, including minors and cancer patients, remain stranded in the UN-patrolled zone between Cyprus’ divided regions.
“The state is now providing food but what is required is a sustainable long-term solution,” said Emilia Strovolidou, the UN agency’s spokesperson. “We’re in talks with the government. There are people who’ve been in limbo for months now and psychologically they’re in a very difficult situation.”
However, Nicholas Ioannides, Cyprus’ deputy minister in charge of migration, said in August his country was not bound under EU law to examine asylum requests even if lodged by claimants in a transit zone.
“Cyprus has taken a decision that it will not accept flows through the green line, particularly as we’ve managed to have zero arrivals via sea,” he said.
Russia launches 4th aerial attack in a week against Ukraine’s grain-exporting Odesa region
- Four Russian missile and drone attacks on the Odesa region this week have killed 14 people and wounded around 20
- The strikes have hit merchant ships and damaged port infrastructure in the region
KYIV: A nighttime Russian missile strike on Odesa killed at least four people including a 16-year-old girl, regional authorities said Friday, in the latest in a series of attacks this week on the southern Ukrainian region that are likely intended to disrupt the country’s grain exports.
Four Russian missile and drone attacks on the Odesa region this week have killed 14 people and wounded around 20, according to local officials. The strikes have hit merchant ships and damaged port infrastructure in the region, which is a vital hub for Ukraine’s agricultural exports through the Black Sea.
An attack on Odesa late Wednesday killed nine people and hit a container ship sailing under the Panamanian flag — the third attack on a merchant vessel in four days, according to regional Gov. Oleh Kiper.
The apparent Russian effort to frustrate Ukraine’s exports, which bring vital revenue for a national economy battered by more than two years of war, coincided with a renewed push by Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to ensure continuing military and financial support from his country’s Western partners.
Ukraine’s stretched and short-handed army is currently under heavy pressure in the country’s eastern Donetsk region. Russian forces recently pushed it out of the Donetsk town of Vuhledar and are now in control of about half of nearby Toretsk, local administration chief Vasyl Chynchyk said Friday. To stop the losses, Zelensky needs to secure more help.
Russia last year tore up an agreement that allowed Ukraine — one of the world’s biggest suppliers of grain and other food staples, especially to developing nations — to export produce safely through the Black Sea.
Months later, and amid successful Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s Black Sea fleet which forced its navy to back away from the coast, Ukraine established a shipping corridor that hugs the coast down to Turkiye and opens a way to the Mediterranean Sea.
A special insurance program has provided affordable coverage to shippers who have carried millions of tons of cargo out of Ukraine, but the latest attacks could jeopardize that arrangement.
Indian man sets Guinness record with largest collection of radios
- Ram Singh Bouddh’s collection consists of 1,400 radio sets
- Oldest is a 1920 model designed by radio inventor Guglielmo Marconi
NEW DELHI:In an increasingly digital world, Ram Singh Bouddh remains committed to radio for entertainment and news, always carrying a pocket set — one of 1,400 in his collection that has recently won him international fame.
A retired supervisor at Warehouse Corp. of India, Bouddh has been collecting various items for the past few decades, but it was radios that eventually won and took over his home in Gajraula in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh.
He now has the largest collection of radios in the world and last week received certification from the Guinness World Records.
Although Bouddh’s collection consists of 1,400 radios, the guidelines required that each be unique, so the official number is 1,257.
“The process started in December last year and the Guinness World Records verified each model and found 1,257 of them unique and after a long rigorous process, they announced my name,” the 69-year-old told Arab News.
“It gave me immense pleasure to get my name registered.”
Plans to establish India’s first radio museum emerged when Prime Minister Narendra Modi mentioned the collection in his monthly radio program “Mann Ki Baat” in November last year.
“That gave me lots of encouragement,” Bouddh said. “There is one radio museum in Britain ... and besides that, there is no other.”
The British Vintage Wireless and Television Museum he referred to was established by Gerry Wells at his home in West Dulwich in the 1970s and has 1,300 wireless receivers on show.
Bouddh’s collection is already bigger, with the oldest radio being a 1920 model from Marconi, a British company founded by Italian engineer Guglielmo Marconi — the inventor of radio and a pioneer of mass media broadcasting.
He also has US military models from the 1930s and other vintage sets he bought or received from across India.
“Most of the radios are in working condition,” he said. “I keep them in two big rooms in the school that I run near my house. My family supports me. My wife and two daughters help me in the pursuit of my passion.”
The family’s efforts are now focused on gathering enough funds to open a proper display.
“Radio has been an important part of human life. TV and mobile are the byproducts of radio. Radio has played an important role in our life ... Hope the Indian government helps me in setting up the country’s first radio museum,” Bouddh said.
“My museum is for future generations, and I want them to know that there was this wonderful medium of communication, which once was part of everybody’s life.”
Thunberg leads pro-Palestinian, climate protest in Milan
- More than 1,000 people, many of them teenagers, joined a peaceful march in the northern Italian city organized by Fridays For Future, the climate change movement Thunberg helped found
MILAN: Swedish activist Greta Thunberg attended a climate change and pro-Palestinian rally in Milan on Friday, days after her criticism of Israel sparked a row over protests in Germany.
More than 1,000 people, many of them teenagers, joined a peaceful march in the northern Italian city organized by Fridays For Future, the climate change movement Thunberg helped found.
Wearing a keffiyeh, a traditional scarf symbolising the Palestinian struggle against Israel, Thunberg walked near the front of the procession as other protesters waved flags, held banners and danced to music.
“Palestinians have been living under suffocating oppression for decades by an apartheid regime, and during the last year with Israel’s live broadcasted genocide, the world has once again abandoned Palestine,” the 21-year-old said in a speech.
The Gaza war began on October 7 last year, when Hamas militants stormed across the border and carried out the worst attack on Israel in its history.
The militants took 251 people hostage in an attack that resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military offensive in Gaza has killed more than 42,000 people, most of them civilians, according to figures provided by the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. The United Nations has acknowledged the figures to be reliable.
Thunberg drew a link between global warming and the weapons industry.
“The fight for climate justice is a fight against the fossil fuel industry, just as much as it is a fight against the weapon industries, militarization and the over-extraction of natural resources,” she said.
German police on Tuesday closed a pro-Palestinian protest camp that had invited Thunberg after a rally she attended in Berlin Monday — the anniversary of the Hamas attack — ended in clashes with police.
She accused Germany of “silencing and threatening activists.”
The Milan march was part of a “national strike for the climate,” a series of protests organized by Fridays For Future across Italy.
“Demonstrating is the only weapon we have against the injustice that we suffer,” said protester Sofia Parisi, 17.
