WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden plans to skip the annual climate talks in Dubai this week, an event expected to draw heads of state and diplomats from about 200 countries and the Vatican. He had been there twice before.
The White House said it was sending a climate team, including special envoy John Kerry, climate adviser Ali Zaidi and clean energy adviser John Podesta.
“While we do not have any travel updates to share with the President at this time, the administration looks forward to a robust and productive COP28,” White House spokesman Angelo Fernández Hernández said, adding that Biden’s team would continue to build on the administration . actions “to address the climate crisis.”
Biden had also promised to visit Africa before the end of the year, but that trip also appears to have been canceled. The White House did not give reasons, but the president is deeply involved in the war in Ukraine and the conflict between Israel and Hamas, as well as in the domestic fights with Congress over government funding.
The two-week COP28 conference starts Thursday and is convened annually by the United Nations. COP stands for ‘Conference of the Parties’ – the countries that agreed to a climate change framework established by the UN in 1992. It has been held 28 times, so this year it is called ‘COP28’.
Countries that signed the agreement pledge to work to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions and prevent “dangerous” human interference in the climate system. Their goal is to rid the world of fossil fuels that are causing global temperatures to rise.
This year the United Arab Emirates, the world’s fifth-largest oil producer, is hosting the climate talks. The conflicts in Eastern Europe and the Middle East can make cooperation between the countries even more difficult.
And Sultan al-Jaber was appointed president-designate, a decision roundly criticized by climate activists because he is the CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co., which wants to boost its production of carbon-emitting crude oil and natural resources. gas.
Biden has called climate change the “ultimate threat to humanity.”
Earlier this month, he released an assessment on the state of climate change in America, saying the issue affects all regions in the US, “not just some, all of them,” he said. “Anyone who willfully denies the effects of climate change is condemning the American people to a very dangerous future,” he said.
Under his tenure, the US passed the Inflation Reduction Act, America’s most significant response to climate change, and promoted the production of cleaner energy. The law aims to boost clean energy on a scale that will bend the arc of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.