NEWS AND COMMENT: This is my opinion on the news about the Cop28 conference taking place in the UAE (United Arab Emirates). Ultimately, Cop28 is about the welfare of all animals and all peoples of the world and I must add fauna. I’m concerned about the welfare of animals both wild and domestic. Climate change affects them all and often negatively. It affects the survivability of many wild species and that’s why I am discussing it in this article.
I am flabbergasted to learn that the president of Cop28, Dr. Sultan al-Jaber, is apparently in a critical state of conflict-of-interest because the conference has the objective of achieving an agreement on phasing out fossil fuels while simultaneously, Dr. Sultan al-Jaber, has counter-productive objectives allegedly in doing deals to facilitate the increased production of oil and gas from fossil fuels.
The Times states that these deals include commercial opportunities for Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, and Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company. Dr. Sultan al-Jaber, is the head of both these organisations.
The host of the UN climate conferences is meant to be impartial and not to use the talks to further its own commercial agenda. Common sense?!
The Cop28 presidency has insisted that al-Jaber’s multiple roles are separate and not in conflict. Comment: but there’s a very strong potential conflict of interest which should be enough to prevent him being the president of this conference. The leaked documents indicate an actual conflict of interest of the most blatant kind.
More than 150 pages of country briefings prepared for Al-Jaber were leaked by a whistleblower and obtained by the Centre for Climate Reporting. The briefings included one before a meeting with China raising the possibility of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company partnering on liquefied gas project in Mozambique, Canada and Australia.
And in another document regarding a meeting with Egypt it’s reported that the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company would continue to seek Egypt’s support to facilitate oil and gas schemes in the country.
Global Witness, a non-profit said that the documents which were first reported by the BBC showed that climate change negotiations had been “hijacked by the oil and gas industry”. In defence, a Cop28 spokesperson told the Times that the documents referred to in the BBC article “are inaccurate and were not used by Cop28 in meetings.”
Comment: Dr al-Jaber has no option other than to resign forthwith to preserve the integrity of the conference. It seems that the world leaders are pissing on the citizens of the world.
