What happened on the fourth day of Cop27?
And so we’re edging towards the end of the first week. Friday, tomorrow, is decarbonisation and industry day, so the events will be themed around that topic.
The US president, Joe Biden, is heading to Egypt and Asia right now. He’s expected to drop into Cop27 tomorrow before going on to the East Asia Summit in Cambodia and then the annual G20 in Indonesia. It will be interesting to see how that galvanises the discussions.
Significant developments today included:
Khaled Ali, the lawyer of the imprisoned hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah, has said he went to the prison where his client was being held but was denied access to visit him.
More than 50 of the poorest developing countries are in danger of defaulting on their debt and becoming effectively bankrupt unless the rich world offers urgent assistance, Achim Steiner, the head of the UN Development Programme has warned.
There is a record number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop this year. There are 600 of them, an increase of more than 25% on last year and they outnumber any one frontline community affected by the climate crisis.
Obviously, protesters are not happy about this and called for the “criminal” fossil fuel representatives to be booted out of Cop.
Some UK politicians made the rounds, with net zero tsar Chris Skidmore fitting in no less than six events. The business secretary, Grant Shapps, was there too, answering questions about UK oil and gas exploration, and the Cop26 president, Alok Sharma, addressed a couple of panels.
Our colleague Damian Carrington brought us two pieces of good news: first that Israel, Lebanon and Iraq have teamed up to reduce emissions, and that Norway is shutting down plans for a large oilfield.
The US speaker, Nancy Pelosi, made some rather extraordinary comments in which she said Republican politicians believe climate breakdown is a “hoax”.
Slovenia is the latest in a long line of European countries to quit the energy charter treaty, which gives energy companies the right to sue governments.
Guardian reporter Nina Lakhani spent much of the day with protesters, who were wearing white in solidarity with murdered and jailed environment defenders around the world. Egypt is responsible for a few of those imprisonments, notably the hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah.
We’ll be blogging again bright and early tomorrow – see you then!
Updated
There is widespread cynicism that the high-level negotiations between dignitaries at Cop27 will lead to significant progress on tackling the climate crisis, new polling suggests.
According to a survey of 4,800 people in 12 countries, 86% agreed there was a need for urgent action to address the crisis, but only 22% believed anything would be achieved at Sharm-el-Sheikh.
As diplomats, dignitaries, activists and executives from around the world gathered in Egypt, the pollsters at Kantar interviewed people in the UK, Egypt, USA, Spain, Italy, India, Germany, France, Colombia, China, Brazil and Australia to find out their feelings about and expectations of the summit.
They found that two out of three people had heard of Cop, but that only a third of people were really familiar with the aims of the meeting. Four out of five people said global, collective and concerted action was important to tackle climate change.
Of the themes on the COP27 agenda, renewable energy and energy transformation was regarded as most important, Kantar said, followed by sustainable water resource management, adaptation and agriculture, and biodiversity.
Ecosystem scientist Friedrich Bohn has been in touch from Sharm El-Sheikh. Bohn (who is also a father to young children) is, like so many, deeply worried about the path we are currently on. He says:
New evidence suggests that multiple tipping points could be triggered if global temperatures rise more than 1.5°C. However, with current policies, we are heading for a temperature rise of 2.8 °C. This would trigger more and dramatic tipping elements, whose healthy state is central to the stability of the Earth system. We must avoid this world at all costs and lay the financial foundations for this at this COP.
His colleagues released a report today which pulled out 10 insights into climate science. The report concludes that “climate change is already exacerbating other risks, such as conflict, pandemics, and food disruption, and will further exacerbate them”.
But Dr Bohn does see some cause for hope. “Structural barriers have led to stalled policies, economies, and societies, driving resource extraction and emissions ever higher. Positive change can be accelerated through progressive social movements, new forms of governance, and appropriate policy tools. We can still create a fair, healthy, safe, and clean future if we have the political will to embrace new economic paradigms that can unlock our potential to decarbonize.”
Inarguable.
Away from the conference, it’s now been announced that Slovenia is the latest is a long line of European countries to quit the energy charter treaty, which gives energy companies the right to sue governments.
Jean Blaylock, trade campaigner at Global Justice Now says:
“It’s very welcome news that Slovenia is quitting this climate-wrecking treaty which remains a major obstacle to anything agreed at Cop27. With the Netherlands, Spain and Poland also heading out the door, the ECT is nothing more than a sinking ship, after countless attempts to reform it have failed.
“This little-known treaty is being used by fossil fuel companies to sue governments over climate action. The Netherlands is being sued for billions over its coal phaseout plans by two energy firms, RWE and Uniper.
“Attempts to reform the ECT have ended up as mere greenwash, which would keep fossil fuel companies protected for ten more years – a decade that is crucial for the transition away from fossil fuels. Now governments are voting with their feet to protect future action. The UK government needs to join the rush for the exit and ditch this treaty now.”
Updated
My colleague, environment correspondent Damien Gayle, has written about a “global wave of actions against private aviation timed to coincide with the Cop27 climate talks”, in which activists in 13 countries, including the UK, Germany, Italy and Australia, have been blocking entrances to private jet airports.
The campaign, led by Extinction Rebellion and Scientist Rebellion in the UK, says it is “targeting the climate destroying, jet-setting life-styles of billionaires and multimillionaires that are exacerbating climate breakdown”.
Gayle references data from FlightRadar which showed 36 private jets landed at Sharm el-Sheikh between 4 and 6 November, and writes:
The climate activists said they were calling on dignitaries gathering at Cop27 to ban the use of private jets, “which are five to 14 times more polluting per passenger than commercial planes, and 50 times more polluting than trains”.
Read the story in full here.
Updated
By the way if you haven’t signed up for our free environmental email yet, you’re missing a treat. Some weeks our correspondents focus in on the key issue of the day, while in others we have guest columnists, such as Daisy Dunne and Josh Gabbatiss in our most recent mail-out.
Good afternoon, I’m Bibi van der Zee, and I’m taking over from Natalie Hanman. Please send stories and thoughts to bibi.vanderzee@theguardian.com, or @bibivanderzee.
Greta Thunberg has responded to the analysis that Global Witness released earlier today, showing the number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop27 is higher than at Cop26 in Glasgow. It’s up more than 25% apparently, and outnumbers almost every country delegation group except for the United Arab Emirates, which has registered 1,070 delegates.
Thunberg says: “If you want to address malaria, you don’t invite the mosquitoes.”
”Global Witness found more than 600 people at the talks in Egypt are linked to fossil fuels.
— Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) November 10, 2022
That's more than the combined delegations from the 10 most climate-impacted countries.”
"If you want to address malaria, you don't invite the mosquitoes”#COP27 https://t.co/n8XUjyXBz3
But some of the comments below disagree – in a fairly polite manner.
Updated
Imprisoned activist’s lawyer denied access at Egyptian jail
Khaled Ali, the lawyer of the imprisoned hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah, has said he went to the prison where his client was being held but was denied access to visit him.
Ali has been unable to get access to see Abd el-Fattah since early 2020, when the British-Egyptian democracy activist was detained without charge after a spate of anti-corruption demonstrations in Egypt.
The veteran human rights lawyer and former Egyptian presidential candidate said earlier today he was suddenly informed by Egypt’s public prosecutor that his repeated requests to visit his client had been granted, and he immediately set off for the desert prison two hours outside of Cairo.
When he arrived, he said he was told by guards that the prosecutor’s permission dated from last night, and that he was required to have permission to enter from the same day.
Abd el-Fattah was sentenced last year for “spreading false news” after sharing a social media post about torture. His defence lawyers including Ali were not given access to his case file before the ruling, which led to him being given a further five years in prison.
A figurehead of the 2011 uprisings, Abd el-Fattah began a hunger strike in April in protest at his detention conditions amid increasing demands from British officials to be granted access to him. Egypt has stonewalled these requests.
After six months on hunger strike, Abd el-Fattah told his family he would stop drinking water on the day that Cop27 in Sharm el-Sheikh began. Earlier today, prison officials told his family the had “undergone a medical intervention with the knowledge of a judicial authority”, suggesting he had been subject to either force-feeding or intravenous rehydration without his consent, a form of torture.
Updated
Some food for thought:
Three developed nations have committed to Loss and Damage payments, the climate reparations facility the global south has been calling out for since 1991: Scotland, Denmark and New Zealand.
— Rachel Donald (@DeBeaudoir) November 8, 2022
What do these countries have in common?
They are led by women.
At this point, maybe we should ask women for help. #COP27 pic.twitter.com/M6ST0MPDTL
— David Ho (@_david_ho_) November 7, 2022
An interesting video here, where activist Ulaiasi Tuikoro explains why loss and damage funds are important for Fiji.
Ulaiasi Tuikoro, a young activist from Fiji, who has been demonstrating at Cop27 said loss and damage is “everything about me”.
“I have lost a lot. I’ve lived through many cyclones. It’s hard to recover from that so for me loss and damage is everything I am.” Tuikoro said not everyone is paying their fair share and loss and damage would help save “whatever we have left”.
“In the Pacific we’ve got this culture of not wanting to complain a lot, but we’re not complaining, we are demanding our place and survival.
“We have tears of resilience [...] and are pleading to our world leaders to save what we can.”
In Fiji, the climate crisis means dozens of villages could soon be underwater. Kate Lyon’s writes on how to move a country.
Updated
In our morning news meeting (interrupted somewhat by the shaky wifi in the Cop conference centre), we discussed how the negotiations were developing, and what we might expect at the end. Now Simon Evans, the incredibly expert deputy editor at Carbon Brief, has posted that “consultations on the all-important ‘cover text’ won’t begin until Saturday”, according to the Cop presidency briefing.
#COP27 latest
— Simon Evans (@DrSimEvans) November 10, 2022
Per presidency, consultations on all-important "cover decision" won't start until Sat
Last yr cover text = Glasgow Climate Pact, inc coal phase down, call for stronger pledges, promise to double adaptation $$ etc…
…what will it say this yr?
(HT @daisydunnesci) pic.twitter.com/Rd4pbmFhoU
The Guardian’s environment editor, Fiona Harvey, wrote about the details of the Cop26 Glasgow Climate Pact at the time.
UK presidency to COP26 spent months running up to the summit consulting on this cover text
— Simon Evans (@DrSimEvans) November 10, 2022
No-one seems to know what the Egyptian #COP27 presidency wants to get into this year's cover text
Hard to imagine it being as big as the Glasgow Pact
At COP26, there were dedicated pages with info on work of UK presidency + ministerial consultations
— Simon Evans (@DrSimEvans) November 10, 2022
At COP27, such info is nowhere to be found (AFAIK)
(left: COP26; right: COP27)https://t.co/Vo9aaAGxt0 pic.twitter.com/pFJ88gpIzS
Please do send thoughts or questions to me, Natalie Hanman, head of environment at the Guardian: natalie.hanman@theguardian.com or @nataliehanman. I’ll be on the blog for the next few hours. Thank you.
Updated
Our picture editors have selected some of the best photographs taken so far at Cop today.
Telling stories through images is an important part of the Guardian’s journalism, and lots of research shows the power of photographs to define how the climate emergency “is understood and acted upon”. Our head of photography, Fiona Shields, has written about that previously here.
Updated
What's happened at Cop27 so far today
I am signing off for the afternoon and my colleague Natalie Hanman is taking over to guide you through events into this evening.
It’s been a colourful day so far at Cop27 and there will be more news to come, so stay tuned to Natalie’s updates.
There is a record number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop this year. There are 600 of them, an increase of more than 25% on last year and they outnumber any one frontline community affected by the climate crisis.
Obviously, protesters are not happy about this and called for the “criminal” fossil fuel representatives to be booted out of Cop.
Some UK politicians made the rounds, with net zero tsar Chris Skidmore fitting in no less than six events. The business secretary, Grant Shapps, was there, too, answering questions about UK oil and gas exploration, and the Cop26 president Alok Sharma addressed a couple of panels.
My colleague Damian Carrington brought us two pieces of good news; first that Israel, Lebanon and Iraq have teamed up to reduce emissions, and that Norway is shutting down plans for a large oilfield.
The US speaker, Nancy Pelosi, made some rather extraordinary comments in which she said Republican politicians believe climate breakdown is a “hoax”.
Guardian reporter Nina Lakhani spent much of the day with protesters, who were wearing white in solidarity with murdered and jailed environment defenders around the world. Egypt is responsible for a few of those imprisonments, notably the hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah. My other colleague Ruth Michaelson reported that his lawyer managed to secure a visit with Abd el-Fattah today, who, it has been rumoured, was recently force-fed.
Have a great rest of the afternoon; our team will be reporting from Cop for the duration, with a daily live blog and lots of news stories to keep you up to date on all the developments.
Updated
It’s the younger people in the world who will bear the brunt of much of the climate emergency. Many world leaders are at an age where they will probably not be alive by 2050, the net zero emissions target.
So today is Youth Day at Cop27, and youth climate activists and practitioners have taken place in a round table with delegates from around the globe.
#COP27 LIVE | Youth Day
— COP27 (@COP27P) November 10, 2022
In the first of two roundtables entitled 'Passing the Baton', youth climate activists and practitioners from across the world engaged in a deep dive discussions about #adaptation, #resilience and #LossAndDamage. pic.twitter.com/7rHJu5hfqc
One young person who was not seen today is Greta Thunberg, who has said she will not be attending the “greenwashing” summit.
“The Cops are mainly used as an opportunity for leaders and people in power to get attention, using many different kinds of greenwashing,” she said earlier this autumn.
Updated
We’ve been hearing a lot of debates about what exactly loss and damage is.
Ulaiasi Tuikoro, a youth activist from Fiji, who has been demonstrating at Cop27, says “it’s everything about me”.
“I have lost a lot. I’ve lived through many cyclones. It’s hard to recover from that so for me loss and damage is everything I am.”
"From Sharm el-Sheik to the Pacific, climate justice is what we need"
— Nikhita Chulani (@NChulani) November 10, 2022
Ulaiasi Tuikoro, a youth activist from Fiji, leads a demonstration at the #Cop27 conference. They were given a 30 minute 'protest slot' and then were told to wrap it up. pic.twitter.com/9Gk5vTooBZ
Tuikoro says that not everyone is paying their fair share for the injustices they have perpetuated and that loss and damage will help save “whatever we have left”.
“In the Pacific we’ve got this culture of not wanting to complain a lot, but we’re not complaining, we are demanding our place and survival.
“We have tears of resilience and our pleading to our world leaders to save what we can.”
In Fiji, the climate crisis means dozens of villages could soon be under water. Relocating so many communities is an epic undertaking. But now there is a plan.
Read my colleague Kate Lyon’s piece on how to move a country.
Updated
Rare good news – Norwegian oil field shuts down
It is hard to find good news on the climate crisis at Cop27 and in particular on keeping fossil fuels in the ground, as scientists have repeatedly said must happen. But most delegates here will be cheered by the news that Norway’s oil company has postponed development of the world’s most northerly oilfield exploitation.
The Wisting field would be a $10bn project, but has been put on ice for four years. The company blamed a “cost increase due to increased global inflation” and “uncertainty about the framework conditions for the project”. Campaigners claimed the move as a victory.
Equinor has been under pressure in Norway over the project and the field may now never be exploited, with some analysts expecting oil demand to peak soon.
Arild Hermstad, leader of Norway’s Green party, told the Guardian: “We are celebrating the good news today. But as long as the Norwegian government does not make a political announcement to stop all new exploration, our credibility as a climate leader at the ongoing climate talks in Egypt is nonexistent.”
Tessa Khan, director of Uplift, said:
“Even if Equinor puts the decision down to rising costs, this is a victory for the climate. Equinor spends a lot on PR telling people that it is transitioning away from oil and gas, but in reality it is planning to develop huge new oil and gas projects.”
UN secretary general, António Guterres, told Cop27 on Tuesday: “Using bogus ‘net zero’ pledges to cover up massive fossil fuel expansion is reprehensible. This toxic coverup could push our world over the climate cliff.”
Updated
Pelosi: many Republicans think climate crisis is a "hoax"
Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, has appeared at Cop27, telling an event it is “hard to speak” about the midterm elections in the US, which could still see Republicans take narrow control of the chamber.
Pelosi, wearing a US and Ukraine flag pin, said that Democrats and Republicans have had “as you would say a disagreement on this issue, they all say it’s a hoax and we’ve got to get past that. This is urgent, this is overdue”.
She added: “We have to save all the children, it’s a moral issue. We can’t have political disagreements over this or let the fossil fuel industry cramp our style. The need is great enough and the urgency is clear enough.”
Pelosi would not dwell on the midterms, which could oust her from her speaker role, but did lament that the US chartered two flights for lawmakers to head to the talks in Egypt, but found little interest due to the elections.
It’s likely Republican control of the House would stymie any further climate bills or climate funding for developing countries. Kathy Castor, chair of the House subcommittee on the climate crisis, spoke alongside Pelosi and said Republicans would “nix” the committee should they gain power.
Nancy Pelosi, for now the speaker of the House, is at Cop27. She says it’s “hard to speak” about the midterms now but points out that many Republicans think the climate crisis is a hoax. “We have to get over that. This is urgent, it’s overdue,” she says pic.twitter.com/zjcoEJGaHR
— Oliver Milman (@olliemilman) November 10, 2022
Updated
The family of the jailed British-Egyptian political prisoner and hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah say that prison authorities informed them he has “undergone a medical intervention with the knowledge of a judicial authority”.
Abd el-Fattah’s mother, the activist Laila Soueif, was prevented from waiting outside Wadi al-Natrun prison where the democracy activist is believed to be held for a fourth day, as the Egyptian authorities refuse to provide further information or allow communication between the jailed democracy activist and his family.
His family said:
Wadi al-Natrun prison officials today refused to allow Laila Soueif to wait at the prison gates. They refused to take receipt of a letter she had written to the prison governor and one to Alaa. They informed her that Alaa had “undergone a medical intervention with the knowledge of a judicial authority”. We are demanding information on the substance of the “medical intervention” and demanding that with the utmost urgency he is moved to a hospital where lawyers and family can reach him. Figures from the respected al-Nadim Centre for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence puts the number of prisoners who have died in Egypt’s prisons this year alone at 40 prisoners. The latest was Ala al-Salmi, 47, who died in Badr 3 prison at the end of October. Mr al-Salmi had been on hunger strike.
The statement from the prison authorities suggests Abd el-Fattah has either been forced fed, forced to accept intravenous fluids or another form of medical treatment he did not consent to, following six months of hunger strike and a water strike that he began on the day Cop27 commenced in Sharm el-Sheikh. His sister, Sanaa Seif, who is attending Cop27, told the Guardian earlier this week that “force-feeding is torture, and nothing should happen that is against Alaa’s will”.
The author Omar Robert Hamilton, Abd el-Fattah’s cousin, said: “This news is seriously worrying. I am not comforted at all and believe he is still at massive risk. The Egyptian authorities are totally opaque, cruel, incompetent, corrupt and so paralysed by fear that information doesn’t travel along chains of command properly – so anything could happen. After being on hunger strike for seven months Alaa’s body is in an incredibly precarious state and the wrong intervention could have terrible consequences. This is against his will, illegal and inhumane. We don’t even know if he is in a hospital or still inside the prison. The cruelty is unfathomable.”
His lawyer Khaled Ali said that he was suddenly granted access to visit him Wadi al Natrun prison for the first time.
Ali tweeted that he is currently en route to the prison to visit the activist after receiving permission to do so from Egypt’s public prosecutor. All of Ali’s previous requests have been denied or ignored, while Egyptian officials have stonewalled ongoing efforts by British consular officials to get access to the campaigner, after repeatedly failing to recognise his dual nationality.
Updated
For those interested in what the UK government is up to, Cop-wise, I received this from environment secretary Thérèse Coffey’s team:
She is going to Cop seeking to maintain the momentum we started at Cop26 by championing nature-based solutions. She’ll be holding bilaterals and joining events to call for ambitious pledges to be met with ambitious action.
She will be there from Monday until Wednesday. However, it might be difficult for her to command respect at the bilaterals considering she very recently admitted to breaching the government’s own Environment Act by missing the deadline to post clean air and water targets. Perhaps getting those out in the open could be a “nature-based solution”.
Updated
Activists highlight jailed and murdered environment and human rights defenders
Gloria Ocampo, Berta Caceres, Marielle Franco, Liliana Peña Chocué, Macarena Valdés, Amaya Morales – just a few of the thousands of murdered environmental and human rights defenders whose names were read at the biggest and most emotive protest at Cop27 so far.
A couple of hundred people gathered wearing white clothes in solidarity with the murdered and jailed defenders around the world who put their bodies on the line to save the planet, but whose voices are missing from Cop27 and the wider fight for climate and social justice. Each person’s name was followed by an emotive shout of “not yet defeated”.
The sobering name call was followed by half a minute of silence, after which speakers from the US, Malaysia, Philippines, South Africa and occupied first nation land in what’s known as Canada, called out the UNFCCC and country states for pushing market-driven solutions while denying frontline communities a seat at the table.
“Stop lying to the people. Move away from carbon credits and other false solutions,” said Siawatu-Salama Ra from Michigan. “It is not a crime to want affordable safe water or clean air to breathe. Free all prisoners, free them all, free him, free him,” she said, apparently referring to the Egyptian-British jailed hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah whose fate is unknown.
Some of the biggest cheers came during the impassioned speech from 29-year-old Zukiswa White from South Africa, who connected dots between the wealth of the rich global north and the degradation and poverty of the global south. “We are still paying for their development, as if their countries were not built off of our backs. We don’t need to know how to take care and nurture our land from those who have destroyed and degraded our land, culture and heritage. That is why we are here at Cop27. If we keep moving in the logic of white supremacy and racist development projects, our kids will be here at Cop100.”
Largest, longest and most emotive protest so far at Cop27 in solidarity with the thousands of environmental and human rights defender murdered and jailed, and the silencing of those alive by the Cop process where >630 fossil fuel lobbyists are now walking the corridors. pic.twitter.com/veoOwtZ9sG
— Nina Lakhani (@ninalakhani) November 10, 2022
White read out a quote from Fikile Ntshangase, a South African activist who fought against a coal mine: “I refused to sign, I cannot sell out my people. If need be, I will die for my people.” Fikile Ntshangase was murdered in 2020.
Updated
Israel, Lebanon and Iraq team up to tackle global heating
In a rare example of climate change concerns taking priority over political hostility, Israel, Lebanon and Iraq have agreed along with other nations to work together to tackle global heating, according to the New Arab website and other reports.
Israel is still officially at war with Lebanon and bans its citizens from having any contact with Israelis, while Israel and Iraq have no diplomatic relations due to a history of hostilities.
“The countries of the region share the warming and drying climate and just as they share the problems they can and must share the solutions. No country can stand alone in the face of the climate crisis,” said Tamar Zandberg, Israel’s outgoing environmental protection minister.
However, the office of Lebanon’s prime minister Najib Mikati, played down any wider significance of the meeting at Cop27, saying it was attended by a large number of Arab and international officials: “There was no contact whatsoever with any Israeli official.”
The Haaretz newspaper said that, according to sources, this is the first high-level regional meeting on climate change that Israel is taking part in.
Israel and Jordan also signed a memorandum of understanding at Cop27 to move ahead with their water-for-energy deal, first announced a year ago. In the proposal, Jordan will build 600 megawatts of solar power capacity to export electricity to Israel in exchange for 200 million cubic meters of desalinated water.
A brilliant picture here of everyone wearing white in solidarity with murdered land defenders and political prisoners. British-Egyptian jailed hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah is in the thoughts of many at the protest. The 40-year-old pro-democracy writer and activist has been behind bars in Egypt for most of the past decade. His friend, the actor Khalid Abdalla, who plays Dodi Fayed in Netflix show The Crown, posted the pictures and said: “If only Alaa could see this”.
If only @alaa could see this. ‘There can be no climate justice without human rights.’ Everyone in white in solidarity with Egyptian political prisoners. #COP27 #FreeAlaa pic.twitter.com/qSqnsfBLei
— Khalid Abdalla (@khalidabdalla) November 10, 2022
In case you have time to watch this – or bookmark it for elevenses – our excellent Fiona Harvey has fronted a Guardian documentary about Cop27. She’s arguably one of the leading Cop experts in the world and has excellent insights, as well as contacts. She gives an overview of the last 30 years of Cops, and asks presidents, global leaders, activists and scientists if global diplomacy is enough to save humanity from the brink of annihilation.
Updated
The Cop26 president Alok Sharma’s had a busy morning, speaking at two different events, one on decarbonising education and another at the UK pavilion about how businesses can hit climate targets.
He said: “Businesses continue to step up work and ambition to make 1.5C a reality.”
Joined @ChathamHouse and supporting businesses at 🇬🇧 Pavilion to launch “Reaching 1.5C: A vision for the future”
— Alok Sharma (@AlokSharma_RDG) November 10, 2022
Businesses continue to step up work & ambition to make 1.5C a reality
Read here 👇https://t.co/wwlKe7sLuG pic.twitter.com/RZzFTL1v6z
Thanks Baroness Barran @educationgovuk for receiving our letter & thanks @AlokSharma_RDG for chairing #COP27 panel on #ClimateEducation 🎙️
— UK Schools Sustainability Network (UKSSN) (@UKSchoolsSusty) November 10, 2022
We agree requires #collaboration #funding #youthvoice 👩🏽🤝👨🏿💷📢
All is forgiven you forgot our #UKSchoolsCOP26 t-shirt! 👕 pic.twitter.com/PDbBmvoWr0
Updated
We promised you the full story on fossil fuel lobbyists, and here it is.
There are more than 600 fossil fuel lobbyists at the Cop27 climate conference, a rise of more than 25% from last year and outnumbering any one frontline community affected by the climate crisis.
My colleague Ruth Michaelson has the story:
Which countries have sent the most delegates to Cop27?
Carbon Brief has done an interesting analysis into who has sent the most delegates to the conference.
By far the top country is the UAE, which has sent more than 1,000 (compared to the UK, which has sent under 100). The UAE is followed by Brazil which has sent 574.
The deep dive is great and worth reading in full but it is also interesting to note that Cops have become more gender-balanced over time. Its analysis reads:
While the average delegation at Cop1 was 88% male and 12% female, this has shifted over time. For example, Cops 23 to 25 all had an average gender balance of 62% male to 38% female, while Cop26 had a balance of 64%-36%.
The provisional gender balance of Cop27 is similar, clocking it at 63% male to 37% female.
Updated
The major breaking news story at Cop27 this morning is that water and fizzy drinks are now free and food is half price after delegates struggled to find enough to eat or drink in the first few days of the summit.
The move has been welcomed with cautious optimism by attendees in Egypt, who have previously complained that the limited food and drink is being sold at New York and London prices.
Big news at #Cop27
— Patrick Greenfield (@pgreenfielduk) November 10, 2022
Water and fizzy drinks are now free. Food is half price. One delegate tells me it could be key to the success of talks after days of supply issues.
“If you don’t provide good food, you won’t get a good outcome,” she says. pic.twitter.com/ae0zsR9gWc
“Having been to these Cops for quite a time, good food is always a problem. If you don’t provide good food, you won’t get a good outcome,” said one lady in a queue.
“We are not really Coca-Cola drinkers but it’s the only choice. The water is still not so available. You can’t find it easily,” added an attendee who was enjoying a bottle of the fizzy drink after the rule change.
Another delegate was delighted by the price change, but feared supply issues would not improve. “I didn’t each lunch yesterday because the queues were too long and I wanted to get to my meetings. It’s not going to change in the next two days,” she said.
Updated
While we wait for more information from negotiations and panels, I have what may be a contender for Cop-related “quote of the day”.
The UK environment minister Trudy Harrison has rebuked her colleagues for saying that the country is the most nature depleted in the world.
“It is not correct to say that we are the most nature-depleted country in the world,” she told MPs. “Depending on the measure, we are 142nd out of 201.” World-beating stuff!
Updated
There are a lot of interesting protests happening today, from a woman in an embellished outfit which proclaims ‘the flood is coming’, to the vegans who have been there each day (a lot of the food on offer seems to be beef and chicken based).
Winter is not coming to Egypt but the flood is… #cop27 #cop27egypt #ClimateAction #TogetherForImplementation pic.twitter.com/Nk8Bm52G4l
— Guio (@WISESAP) November 10, 2022
Updated
UK politicians trumpet 'climate achievements' on the schmooze circuit
Though the UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, hotfooted it back to England pretty swiftly after his underwhelming speech to the conference on Monday, there are still a handful of politicians knocking around.
Chris Skidmore, the UK’s net zero tsar, is speaking at six different events during Cop, and seems to be thoroughly enjoying his time in Sharm El-Sheikh.
He tells me:
I am delighted to be at Cop27 as part of the UK delegation and to speak about the net zero review and the progress we have made. So far the review has held 38 evidence roundtables and been taking evidence from across the UK – along with receiving over 1,800 written evidence submissions.
I’m keen to maintain the level of collaboration internationally, to demonstrate that the UK remains internationally leading in our climate policies and the review is a fantastic opportunity to establish new policies and frameworks that can ensure we can go further and faster on emissions reductions – and show other nations how they can deliver and implement their own net zero targets.
I will be speaking at the UK pavilion for several events and also addressing separately the Climate Leadership Summit, the UK corporate leaders group and a number of events on how to build collaboration and demonstrate the wider society benefits of what net zero can achieve for local communities.
Also at the conference is the business secretary, Grant Shapps, who has been snapped posing up a storm with other delegates in between fielding questions about how exactly the UK plans to be ‘world leading’ on climate while exploiting more north sea oil and gas against climate change committee recommendations.
A @grantshapps sighting in Sharm #COP27P pic.twitter.com/8yRGYExxLd
— Rachel Kennedy (@rachelkennedy84) November 10, 2022
I’m also told that Thérèse Coffey, the UK’s environment secretary, is heading down soon with her team to speak to the conference about nature-based solutions. Perhaps we will hear more about the plans for nature friendly farming payments – currently on ice – and how we can be world leaders on this issue when there are currently hundreds of environment laws at risk from being lost from the statute book due to Brexit.
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'We demand clean air and water' – protesters slam fossil fuel 'criminals'
As news broke of the 600+ fossil fuel lobbyists at this year’s summit, climate justice activists from Asia, Africa, and the Americas protested in the main courtyard in the blue zone demanding that the UNFCCC kick polluters out from Cop.
“We are here representing millions of people who are demanding that the polluters be kicked out of the Cop space and policy making. For more than half a century they kept the truth about the harms from the people. They delayed action because of greed. You can let the criminals set the rules, we have to reset the system. We are calling them out,” said Aderonke Lge from Public Participation Africa.
Nishant Kumar Alag from India added: “We call them polluters and violators, but we’re talking about criminals. We demand the right to clean water, air and land, and no safe haven for the criminals.”
As the delegates rushed past, heads down en route to another long day in the main negotiating rooms and event spaces, the protesters sang: “All we are saying is kick polluters out.” Lots of people are wearing white today in solidarity with the thousands of land and environmental defenders killed and criminalised around the world, and with the tens and thousands of political prisoners here in Egypt and around the world.
On the #HumanRights day @COP27 people using their right to protest to say:
— CAN EUROPE (@CANEurope) November 10, 2022
"Nowhere is that more clear than at #COP27, where Big Polluters like fossil fuel lobbyists have once again converged to greenwash their polluting image and block the #ClimateAction we so desperately need." pic.twitter.com/bFday01fiI
Exorbiant hotel and travel costs, visa delays and accreditation limits have made access to Cop27 incredibly challenging for activists and grassroots leaders including those from Africa – despite this being dubbed the African Cop.
Gina Cortes Valderrama from Colombia said lobbyists were everywhere while those on the frontline of the climate crisis cannot get access to Cop. “It’s a clear signal of what the colonial structures here value and prioritise.”
As US officials including John Kerry hold events at the climate justice pavilion – a space and term that activists say polluters and their allies are trying to co-opt, a host of protests and actions are planned in the blue zone.
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Record number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop27
A new analysis by the groups Global Witness, Corporate Europe Observatory and Corporate Accountability has calculated that 636 fossil fuel lobbyists are registered to attend Cop27.
This is up more than 25% from last year, and the number is larger than any single national delegation except the United Arab Emirates, they report.
The UAE, who will host Cop28 next year, have an astonishing 1,070 delegates in attendance, up from 176 last year.
We’ll have a story shortly, but in the meantime you can read the Global Witness report here.
What to look out for at Cop27 today
Good morning from a blustery Sharm El-Sheikh. Here is what to look out on youth day at Cop27:
Nancy Pelosi will speak at the climate summit at around 11:15am London time in what might be one of her last appearances as House speaker in the US. It comes after a better than expected performance by the Democrats in the midterm elections, but it seems like they are on course to lose control of the House of Representatives.
Several youth-led events will be held throughout the day, including intergenerational panels on loss and damage, mitigation and a just transition.
Yesterday evening, the sister of the jailed hunger striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah was informed that a pro-government lawyer has filed a case against her with the Egyptian public prosecutor accusing her of espionage and “spreading false news” after she spoke earlier this week at Cop27, reported the Guardian’s Ruth Michaelson and Patrick Wintour.
Activists are wearing white today at Cop27 in solidarity with murdered land defenders and political prisoners, with protests planned throughout the day.
UK business secretary Grant Shapps is at the climate summit where he is likely to face questions about North sea oil and gas and onshore wind.
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Good morning, and welcome to the Guardian’s rolling coverage of Cop27. Our team in Sharm el-Sheikh will be sending through updates and reports.
After the first two days were dedicated largely to world leaders’ speeches, yesterday the negotiations began in earnest. You can read a roundup of the main points here:
The UN has posted today’s programme of meetings and events here – we will bring you news from the most important and interesting ones.
I’m Helena Horton, and you can send me tips, stories, comments and questions at helena.horton@theguardian.com, or on Twitter at @horton_official.
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