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‘Wrecking ball’: The oil-rich nation blocking UN climate talks

20 0
22.11.2024

The COP29 climate talks in Azerbaijan are dragging towards an ugly and late finish as powerful voices call for massive reforms to the system, while a voting bloc led by Saudi Arabia seeks to slow progress and even undo a key success from last year.

The oil industry still dominates Baku, host to the COP29 United Nations climate talks.Credit: AP

The well-funded Saudi Arabian diplomatic machine has been acting as a “wrecking ball”, says Alden Meyer, a veteran of 28 of these vast and messy events who is now a senior analyst with the London-based climate research group E3G.

Meyer says Saudi Arabia has become so adept at playing the complex game of United Nations climate diplomacy that it led the push for the organisation to adopt a consensus approach. That would mean making a major decision would require all 200 or so countries signed up to the climate treaty to agree.

That makes it very easy for Saudi Arabia and sympathetic oil-rich nations to slow the process. Even better, from their point of view, reforming the system also needs consensus.

“It was a brilliant strategy by Saudi Arabia,” Meyer told this masthead. “They’re very dogged. They’re........

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