Saudi Arabia is at the forefront of countries dissatisfied with the progress of financing negotiations at the United Nations climate change conference, COP30, but an impasse between rich countries and smaller economies has forced the postponement of a decision on the topic scheduled for this Wednesday (12th).
Panorama has been reported sheetsaid three people who followed the negotiations on condition of anonymity.
They say there was already a feeling since last Tuesday (11th) that more time was needed to reach an agreement.
The decision, expected this Wednesday, should address the main hurdle in all previous climate change negotiations: rich countries’ resistance to meeting the poorest countries’ demands for more financing.
Ambassador Andre Correa de Lago, President of COP30, said on Wednesday that the document summarizing the results of the consultations on the four proposed items on the agenda will only be presented on Saturday (15th).
The four areas are funding for developing countries, transparency reporting, responding to the NDCs crisis (referred to in the Paris Agreement as national carbon emissions reduction targets, the English acronym for nationally determined contributions), and unilateral trade measures.
Correa do Lago said there were disagreements on certain topics. He then cited as an example questions related to the actions of developed countries, particularly those of developing countries in the debate on financing the energy transition in small islands, which seeks to prioritize this topic.
“Obviously their positions are different,” he said. The ambassador denied there was a heated debate and said disagreements were natural. “Of course there are disagreements, but the issues are actually very complex.”
COP30 CEO Ana Toni said negotiations were progressing well, but that some delegations wanted to confirm the possibility of an agreement with their governments. “So they also need time to negotiate domestically,” he says.
According to her, this situation is observed in all four issues proposed for discussion. Africans and Arabs were among the countries that asked for more time for discussion.
But Lago said the delegation was deepening its dialogue and the working environment was “very positive.” “The conversation is going very well in the sense that everyone wants to suggest ideas. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to have such an active conversation,” he said.
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