With COP29 in Baku now in its second – and final – week, UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk has reiterated his call for urgent human rights-based climate action.
We need COP29 to mobilise trillions – not billions – of dollars in climate finance to keep the increase in global average temperature under 1.5 degrees Celsius, and to catalyse more ambitious national climate commitments.
We should expect – and demand – that those that have contributed the most to climate change to date pay more. Those most affected by climate change must have the funds they need to build resilience to climate change as well as access to effective remedy.
These are urgent human rights priorities. This makes it all the more concerning that there has been a discernible lack of progress on many vital issues so far at COP29, and even some efforts to backtrack on previously agreed human rights language.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights stresses that the COP29 negotiations are about our collective future. The choice is stark – remain on the current devastating trajectory for the planet and humanity or work for a rapid, equitable and just transition to sustainable economies and societies with human rights at their core.
