Climate agenda reset ahead of Brazil’s COP 30
With the entire COP process now in growing jeopardy, the country has the diplomatic challenge of a lifetime to make the event one that helps ensure long-lasting and transformative climate outcomes
THE climate diplomacy agenda has been badly on the backfoot since at least November’s US presidential ballot which saw the re-election of Donald Trump. However, this Wednesday and Thursday (May 7-8), Europe hosts what may be the biggest meeting of climate ministers before November’s Conference of the Parties (COP) 30 in Brazil to try to kickstart this key business and political agenda.
The Brazilian president-designate of COP 30, Andre Correa do Lago, will co-host this week’s event in Copenhagen. This is an inauspicious geographical backdrop given that almost two decades ago, the same city hosted one of the worst ever organised COPs. So much so that the then-US secretary of state Hillary Clinton told then-US president Barack Obama, upon his arrival at the-then COP 15 in Denmark, that it was “the worst meeting I’ve been to since eighth grade student council” of 13-14 years olds.
Fast-forward to 2025, and with their backs to the wall, Correa do Lago and Danish counterpart Lars Aagaard will seek to energise the summit of more than 40 climate ministers – ahead of COP 30. The latter is the most important annual climate event since at least Glasgow’s COP 26 in 2021, and possibly even the landmark Paris COP 21 in 2015.
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