Photo credit: IISD/ENB | Kiara Worth.  Retrieved from carbonbrief.org

Excerpt from carbonbrief.org

After lengthy and heated negotiations, diplomats have largely agreed on a draft framework for a new UN fund to help nations recover from the “loss and damage” caused by climate change.

Last year’s COP27 summit in Egypt marked a victory for developing nations when they secured agreement on this fund – an idea many had been advancing for decades.

A transitional committee composed of members from developed and developing countries was tasked with discussing everything from who would pay into this fund to where it would be located, ahead of a final decision due to be taken at COP28 in Dubai next month.

Meetings overran this year as members clashed over long-standing grievances. Developing countries did not want to see the fund based at the US-dominated World Bank and wanted to ensure it was accessible for as much of the global south as possible.

Developed countries wanted to see funds coming from sources besides their public coffers, including those of the wealthiest developing nations, such as China and Saudi Arabia.

In the end, the final committee meeting held last weekend in Abu Dhabi settled on a draft proposal that would see the new fund housed at the World Bank for at least four years.

Neither developed countries nor anyone else would be obliged to pay into the fund.

This proposal will now form the basis of a final decision by leaders at COP28.

While the committee’s recommendations were adopted by consensus, a last-minute objection from the US provides an early indication that those talks at the UN’s upcoming climate summit may not progress smoothly.