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In-person UN summit termed 'key to addressing climate concerns'

WION Web Team
New DelhiUpdated: Jun 05, 2021, 10:24 PM IST
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The emblem of the United Nations. Photograph:(AFP)

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The 26th edition of the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties -- COP26 -- marks the biggest climate summit since the 2015 Paris negotiation

The president of United Nations' upcoming global summit to tackle climate change said that the in-person summit must go ahead. He was quoted by AFP

The 26th edition of the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties -- COP26 -- marks the biggest climate summit since the 2015 Paris negotiation.

COP26 will involve negotiators from 196 countries and the European Union, along with businesses, experts and world leaders, and is scheduled to start November 1 in the Scottish city of Glasgow.

"We need to have a physical event. We cannot allow any further delay," COP26 President Alok Sharma told AFP in Dhaka.

"We've already delayed COP by one year and I'm afraid that during that year climate change has not abated. In fact, last year was the hottest year on record, the last decade was the hottest on record."

Sharma said that governments around the world have backed a physical event. He added that every precaution was being taken to ensure safety of delegates and the local community

"We are looking at all Covid-secure measures, including vaccines, to deal with this particular issue."

Nations around the world committed under the 2015 Paris accord to keeping the global temperature increase to under two degrees Celsius, and ideally closer to 1.5 degrees by 2050.

The upcoming talks are crucial to meeting the target.

"This is going to be the decisive decade. And we have to act now," Sharma said.

"All countries need to come forward, set out ambitious plans to cut their emissions, but also to be carbon neutral, to be net zero emissions by the middle of the century."

(With inputs from agencies)