Category: UN General Assembly (Page 3 of 3)

UN chief warns: IPCC report; ‘Code red’ for human driven global heating.

August 10, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Climate change is widespread, rapid, and intensifying, and some trends are now irreversible, at least during the present time frame, according to the latest much-anticipated Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, released on Monday.

Human-induced climate change is already affecting many weather and climate extremes in every region across the globe. 

Scientists are also observing changes across the whole of Earth’s climate system; in the atmosphere, in the oceans, ice floes, and on land.

Many of these changes are unprecedented, and some of the shifts are in motion now, while some – such as continued sea level rise – are already ‘irreversible’ for centuries to millennia, ahead, the report warns.

But there is still time to limit climate change, IPCC experts say.

Strong and sustained reductions in emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases, could quickly make air quality better, and in 20 to 30 years global temperatures could stabilize.

‘Code red for humanity’

The UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the Working Group’s report was nothing less than “a code red for humanity.

The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable”.

He noted that the internationally-agreed threshold of 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels of global heating was “perilously close.

We are at imminent risk of hitting 1.5 degrees in the near term.

The only way to prevent exceeding this threshold, is by urgently stepping up our efforts, and persuing the most ambitious path.

“We must act decisively now, to keep 1.5 alive.”

The UN chief in a detailed reaction to the report, said that solutions were clear.

“Inclusive and green economies, prosperity, cleaner air and better health are possible for all, if we respond to this crisis with solidarity and courage”, he said.

He added that ahead of the crucial COP26 climate conference in Glasgow in November, all nations – especiall the advanced G20 economies – needed to join the net zero emissions coaltion, and reinforce their promises on slowing down and reversing global heating, “with credible, concrete, and enhanced Nationally Determined Contributions ” that lay out detailed steps.

Time is running out

The IPCC scientists warn global warming of 2°C will be exceeded during the 21st century.

Unless rapid and deep reductions in CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions occur in the coming decades, achieving the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement “will be beyond reach”.

The assessment is based on improved data on historical warming, as well as progress in scientific understanding of the response of the climate system to human-caused emissions, according UN News.

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United Nations climate science talks open amid heatwaves, floods and drought.

July 27, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Negotiations began on Monday to approve a UN science report which will anchor high level summits later this year, charged with boosting climate action worldwide.

The assessment comes as record-breaking heat waves, devasting floods and drought struck across three continents in recent weeks.

“This report has been prepared in exceptional circumstances, and this is an unprecedented IPCC approval session,” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Chair, Hoesung Lee, told the opening session of the meeting.

The report, Climate Change 2021: the Physical Science Basis, by IPCC Working Group I brings together the latest advances in climate science and multiple lines of evidence to provide an up-to-date physical understanding of the climate system and climate change.

“Assessments and special reports have been foundational to our understanding of climate change, the severe and growing risks it poses throughout the world and the urgent need for action to address it,” said UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Patricia Espinosa, on Monday.

But she warned that the world is at a “climate crossroads” and decisions taken this year would determine whether it will be possible to limit global warming to 1.5°C above the pre-industrial era by the end of the century.

3 degrees looming

“The world is currently on the opposite track, heading for a 3°C rise,” she said. “We need to change course urgently.”

Following the recent deadly flooding in several western European countries, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) called for all nations to do more to hold back climate change-induced disasters.

“Climate change is already very visible.

We don’t have to tell people that it exists,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas told the opening session.

“We are seeing more extreme events.

Heatwaves, drought and the flooding events in Europe and China,” he said. 

“Massive heating” in the Arctic is affecting the atmospheric dynamics in the northern hemisphere, as evidenced by stagnant weather systems and changes in the behaviour of the jet stream, added the WMO chief.

“We have been telling the world that science has spoken and it’s now up to the policymakers for action”, said IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee.

The meeting is being held remotely from 26 July to 6 August, with the aim of ensuring that the summary for policymakers is accurate, well-balanced and presents the scientific findings clearly.

Subject to the decisions of the panel, the report will be released on 9 August, just weeks ahead of the UN General Assembly opening, a G20 summit, and the 197-nation COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, according UN News.

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United Nations experts: free, fair Palestinian elections, must include East Jerusalem.

July 27, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Landmark elections in the Occupied Palestinian territory must be rescheduled soon and include East Jerusalem, three UN independent human rights experts said in a statement on Monday. 

The first parliamentary and presidential elections in 15 years were scheduled to take place in May and July, respectively. 

But they were postponed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on 29 April, amid concerns about the ability to vote in East Jerusalem.   

Expressing their deep concern over the postponement, the UN experts called on the Palestinian Authority and Israel “to take all steps necessary within their power” to reschedule the elections “within a reasonably short timeframe”, and to ensure they are free, fair, democratic, peaceful and credible. 

“The Palestinian elections present a monumental opportunity to renew the democratic process, to address the long-standing internal political divisions, to strengthen accountable institutions and to take an important step towards achieving the fundamental national and individual rights of the Palestinian people,” they said. 

“We call upon Israel to clearly state that it will allow the full democratic participation of Palestinians in East Jerusalem in the planned elections.

As the occupying power in East Jerusalem, it must interfere as little as possible with the rights and daily lives of the Palestinians.” 

The rights experts noted that Palestinians in East Jerusalem have the right to participate in elections under the 2005 Oslo Agreements, and have voted on three previous occasions, albeit with considerable difficulties. 

“The international community has repeatedly stated, through the UN Security Council and the General Assembly, that all Israeli alterations to East Jerusalem’s demography and to its political and legal status are null and void,” they said.

“Here is a golden opportunity for the world to affirm these commitments in the name of democracy and international law.” 

They called upon the Palestinian Authority to reschedule the elections for the near future and urged all sides, “including the occupying power”, to respect democratic when they are held, according UN News.

The three UN experts who issued the statement are: Michael Lynk, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory; Irene Khan, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of expression, and Clément Nyaletsossi Voule, Special Rapporteur on rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association.  

They were appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, and serve in their individual capacity and on a voluntary basis. 

Independent experts are not UN staff, neither are they paid by the Organization.

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United Nations chief: no pathway to reach the Paris Agreement’s 1.5˚C goal without the G20.

July 26, 2021 / / 0 Comments

“The world urgently needs a clear and unambiguous commitment to the 1.5 degree goal of the Paris Agreement from all G20 nations”, António Guterres said on Sunday after the Group failed to agree on the wording of key climate change commitments during their recent Ministerial Meeting on Environment, Climate and Energy.

“There is no pathway to this goal without the leadership of the G20.

This signal is desperately needed by the billions of people already on the frontlines of the climate crisis and by markets, investors and industry who require certainty that a net zero climate resilient future is inevitable”, the UN Secretary General urged in a statement.

The UN chief reminded that science indicates that to meet that ‘ambitious, yet achievable goal’, the world must achieve carbon neutrality before 2050 and cut dangerous greenhouse gas emissions by 45 % by 2030 from 2010 levels. “But we are way off track”, he warned.

The world needs the G20 to deliver

With less than 100 days left before the 2021 United Nations Climate Conference COP 26, a pivotal meeting that will be held in Glasgow at the end of October, António Guterres urged all G20 and other leaders to commit to net zero by mid-century, present more ambitious 2030 national climate plans and deliver on concrete policies and actions aligned with a net zero future.

These include no new coal after 2021, phasing out fossil fuel subsidies and agreeing to a minimum international carbon pricing floor as proposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

“The G7 and other developed countries must also deliver on a credible solidarity package of support for developing countries including meeting the US$100 billion goal, increasing adaptation and resilience support to at least 50% of total climate finance and getting public and multilateral development banks to significantly align their climate portfolios to meet the needs of developing countries”, he highlighted.

The UN Chief informed that he intends to use the opportunity of the upcoming UN General Assembly high-level session to bring leaders together to reach a political understanding on these critical elements of the ‘package’ needed for Glasgow.

The G20 ministers, which met in Naples, Italy on July 23-25, couldn’t agree to a common language on two disputed issues related to phasing out coal and the 1.5-degree goal, which now will have to be discussed at the G20 summit in Rome in October, just one day before the COP 26 starts, according UN News.

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