Climate summits ‘no longer fit for purpose’ in addressing crisis, say former political leaders and scientists

Future UN climate summits should be held only in countries that can show clear support for climate action and have stricter rules on fossil fuel lobbying, according to a group of influential climate policy experts and scientists.
The group calling for a radical overhaul of annual negotiations known as Cops includes former president of Ireland Mary Robinson; former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, former UN climate chief Christiana Figueres, and prominent climate scientist Johan Rockström.
The call was backed by the leading Irish scientist within the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Prof Peter Thorne. He told The Irish Times the scale of the summits had become “beyond crazy”. They should be shrunk in size and limited to government delegations with an input from invited experts, while allowing some key observers including the media, he said.
Political leaders should also attend, he added, with a view to acting with urgency on what they learn and hear.
Prof Thorne said he was attending his first Cop and could only justify flying to the event because he was directly involved in scientific work, notably analysing the latest global warming trends with the World Meteorological Organisation.
[ Cop29 opens with fossil fuel companies and host country Azerbaijan targeted by protestsOpens in new window ]
The group of leaders and scientists has written to the UN demanding the current complex process of annual “conferences of the parties” under the UN framework convention on climate change – the Paris agreement’s parent treaty – be streamlined, and meetings held more frequently, with more of a voice given to developing countries.
“It is now clear that the Cop is no longer fit for purpose. We need a shift from negotiation to implementation,” they wrote.
The letter was circulated at Cop29 as it was nearing its halfway mark in Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku.
Azerbaijan is a controversial host for the conference, as it is a major fossil fuel producer, with oil and gas making up half of its exports. Last year’s conference was also held in a petrostate, the United Arab Emirates, where lead negotiator Sultan Al Jaber kept his main job of heading the country’s national oil company, Adnoc.
Before Cop29 opened, one of the key members of the Azerbaijan government’s organising team was filmed appearing to offer help with striking fossil fuel deals. Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev, also remarked at the opening ceremony that his country’s oil and gas were “a gift of God”.
At least 1,773 coal, oil, and gas lobbyists have been granted access to Cop29, a new report has found, raising concerns about the planet-heating industry’s influence on the negotiations.
If considered as a delegation, the lobbyists outnumber the size of delegation of almost every other country at the conference, analysis from the Kick Big Polluters Out (KBPO) coalition shows, with the only exceptions being this year’s host country, Azerbaijan, next year’s host Brazil, and Turkey.
Sarah McArthur, an activist with the environmental group UK Youth Climate Coalition, which is a member of the KBPO coalition, said: “Cop29 kicked off with the revelation that fossil fuel deals were on the agenda, laying bare the ways that industry’s constant presence has delayed and weakened progress for years. The fossil-fuel industry is driven by their financial bottom line, which is fundamentally opposed to what is needed to stop the climate crisis – namely, the urgent and just phase-out of fossil fuels.”
The 10 most climate-vulnerable nations have only a combined 1,033 delegates at the negotiations. “Industry presence is dwarfing that of those on the front lines of the climate crisis,” the analysis says. – Additional reporting Guardian