FOSSIL FUELED FOREIGN POLICY: WHY COP26 FLOPPED

Western observers want to blame India for the failure of the UN climate talks. Not so fast.

Basav Sen, December 1st 2021 Foreign Policy in Focus

The UN climate talks (Conference of the Parties, or COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland, concluded in mid-November with deeply disappointing results. In spite of what the global scientific community has termed a dire climate emergency, countries made weak commitments that condemn the world’s most vulnerable people to what Ugandan youth climate activist Vanessa Nakate has called ​“a death sentence for communities like mine.”

There were a handful of bright spots. One of them was the launch of the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance,“ an international coalition of governments and stakeholders working together to facilitate the managed phase-out of oil and gas production,” by Costa Rica, Denmark, and several other national and subnational governments (including California). The United States, the world’s largest oil and gas producer, was conspicuously absent.

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