A week of tense negotiations to draft a legally binding treaty combating global plastic pollution ended in failure on Sunday night in Busan, South Korea, marking only the latest setback for global environmental diplomacy after disappointing outcomes at Cop29 and the Cop16 biodiversity summit.
The talks, which brought together nearly 200 countries under the UN Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5), failed to resolve critical issues, including limits on plastic production, regulations on hazardous chemicals, and financial mechanisms to support developing nations.
