They don’t want this president. A hundred elected officials from the American Congress and the European Parliament called on Tuesday, May 23, for the withdrawal of the nomination of a boss from the oil industry to chair the next COP28, an annual meeting to fight against global warming. , to Dubai. “We urge you to press for the United Arab Emirates to renounce the appointment of Sultan Al-Jaber”they write, sharing their “deep concern”. Oil is, along with coal and gas, the main cause of global warming caused by human activities.
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The missive is addressed to US President Joe Biden, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. Simon Stiell, executive secretary of the UN Climate, is also the recipient. The appointment of this forties, Emirati Minister of Industry and boss of the oil giant ADNOC, to chair the UN climate conference scheduled for the end of 2023 had already been strongly criticized in January by a hundred NGOs.
These elected officials want to limit “the influence of polluting industries”
In their missive, the elected officials also ask to limit “the influence of polluting industries” in these climate meetings, deploring the prominence of lobbies. “We cannot let special interests create more obstacles in the race against climate change”, pleaded Sheldon Whitehouse, one of the most committed US senators on climate issues, on Twitter. In Brussels, this letter was signed by 99 ecologist deputies, left and center-left.
Questioned by AFP in April, Sultan Al-Jaber defended himself by recalling that he was also the founder of Masdar, a national Emirati giant specializing in renewable energies and he had assured that his country had been working on its energy transition since “more than twenty years”.