World leaders to meet in Glasgow on Monday for climate talks

The world’s leading climate researchers agree that emissions are rising, not falling, in many regions, despite promises and good words. Recent UN figures show that CO2 emissions in the past year have been higher than ever. Therefore, without prompt action, the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement cannot be achieved.

The conversation in Glasgow, known as COP26, will also be dedicated to this.

Cajara Martinelli, director of the European Climate Action Network, a coalition of non-governmental organizations, said countries should eventually move from words to deeds.

“More needs to be done to make COP26 not only the space for the big announcements, but also the pinnacle of responsibility. It should become a place where there is a solid short and medium-term approach to keeping global temperatures below one.” Period plans are announced and half a degree by the end of this century.” Martinelli said.

The European Union is one of the few regions in the world that has not only announced its intention to reduce emissions, but has also taken concrete steps to achieve these goals. Therefore, a plan to reduce CO2 emissions by 55% by 2030 is currently being proposed for national discussion.

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croce urged other regions of the world, especially the G20, to take similar steps.

“Combating climate change is the world’s most serious challenge. In Europe, with plans to reduce emissions by 55%, we are showing a very high level of ambition, and this is necessary because it requires more innovation, new technologies.” And a change in lifestyle is needed. Therefore, our message to the G20 is: “There is no country, no continent, that can do it alone. We can do this only when the whole world works together. So join Europe’s goals,” de Croa said.

The head of the Danish government, Mette Fredriksen, also spoke. He, along with the prime ministers of Belgium, Sweden, Estonia, Latvia and several other countries, signed a call for G20 members to do more.

“We believe that the new UN climate report shows that we all need to be even more ambitious at the national, global and European levels. This is why COP26 in Glasgow is so important,” Fredrickson said.

The EU will speak as a single bloc in the Glasgow climate debate. So it is one of the biggest and most important interlocutors.

However, the ambitious commitments are not easy to implement in Europe as well. For example, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban, has been actively criticizing the recent proposal by the European Commission’s vice-president, Frans Timmermann, to include transport and buildings in the emissions trading scheme. Orbans also blames climate policy for the fact that gas prices are now rising.

“Indeed, the line is between common sense and the lack of it. That’s the real problem. Look at energy prices. What Timmerman and others are proposing will destroy the European middle class. But European democracy is based on the middle class. New rules that raise prices in the sky will end the “middle class not only in the East, but also in the West. Because on one side there is common sense and on the other side there are imaginations. Utopia will kill us.

However, most European politicians said that green change is not a problem but a solution. Latvian Economics Minister Janis Wittenbergs (National Union) also acknowledged in talks in Luxembourg this week that if more electricity is produced in the Baltic from local raw materials, the current rise in gas prices would not be so painful for consumers.

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