COP28 conference looks set for conflict after tense negotiations on climate damage fund

Image Credit: AP Photo/Biswaranjan Rout, File. Retrieved from apnews.com

Tense negotiations at the final meeting on a climate-related loss and damages fund — an international fund to help poor countries hit hard by a warming planet — ended Saturday in Abu Dhabi, with participants agreeing that the World Bank would temporarily host the fund for the next four years.

The United States and several developing countries expressed disappointment in the draft agreement, which will be sent for global leaders to sign at the COP28 climate conference, which begins in Dubai later this month.

The U.S. State Department, whose officials joined the negotiations in Abu Dhabi, said in a statement it was “pleased with an agreement being reached” but regretted that the consensus reached among negotiators about donations to the fund being voluntary is not reflected in the final agreement.

The agreement lays out basic goals for the fund, including for its planned launch in 2024, and specifies how it will be administered and who will oversee it, including a requirement for developing countries to have a seat on the board, in addition to the World Bank’s role.

Avinash Persaud, a special envoy to Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley on climate finance, said the agreement was “a challenging but critical outcome. It was one of those things where success can be measured in the equality of discomfort.” Persaud negotiated on behalf of Latin America and the Caribbean in the meetings.

He said that failure to reach an agreement would have “cast a long shadow over COP.”