Speaking at the conclusion of the UN-organized Bonn Climate Change Conference, Ann Harrison, Amnesty International Climate Justice Advisor said:
“Provision of greater climate finance and guarantees around civic space are essential if COP29 later this year is to advance human rights-based solutions to the climate crisis. Unfortunately the lack of progress towards these goals in Bonn is concerning.
“Restrictions on civic space in Bonn have highlighted how essential it is to ensure that the rights of participants attending COP29 in Baku in November are protected and guaranteed, especially freedom of expression and peaceful protest. These rights are regularly abused in Azerbaijan, a repressive petrostate which detains its critics, including environmental human rights defenders.
“The Host Country Agreement, which sets out arrangements between the COP summit organizers and the host authorities, must guarantee these rights. The document should also be made publicly available in time for attendees to assess any risks they could face. It is unacceptable that the Host Country Agreement for last year’s COP28 in the United Arab Emirates has only just been made available to us and contains no reference to the protection of these rights.
“Far too little progress has been made at Bonn to ensure that states will agree a new adequately scaled-up target at COP29 for finance from high-income polluting countries to lower-income states on the frontline of the climate crisis. G7 countries, and others, including high-income fossil fuel producing states, must act to help protect the rights of people in lower income countries who are bearing the brunt of climate change but are least responsible for causing it. It is time for historical polluters to pay the climate debt they owe.”
Background
The Bonn Climate Change Conference which ended today and COP29, which will be held from November 11-22, 2024 in Baku, Azerbaijan, are held under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Amnesty International supports calls for a fast, fair, funded and forever phase out of fossil fuels and a human-rights compliant transition to renewable energy, and campaigns for the protection of free expression and peaceful protest in relation to climate action.
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