Nations at UN climate talks agree on $300 billion a year for poor countries in a compromise deal

Update Nations at UN climate talks agree on $300 billion a year for poor countries in a compromise deal
COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev speaks during a closing plenary meeting at the COP29 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Nov. 24, 2024. (REUTERS)
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Updated 24 November 2024
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Nations at UN climate talks agree on $300 billion a year for poor countries in a compromise deal

Nations at UN climate talks agree on $300 billion a year for poor countries in a compromise deal
  • EU, US, others raised their offer after earlier draft rejected
  • Climate talks run into overtime. Talks reach deal on carbon credits

BAKU, Azerbaijan: United Nations climate talks adopted a deal to inject at least $300 billion annually in humanity’s fight against climate change, aimed at helping poor nations cope with the ravages of global warming in tense negotiations in the city where industry first tapped oil.
The $300 billion will go to developing countries who need the cash to wean themselves off the coal, oil and gas that causes the globe to overheat, adapt to future warming and pay for the damage caused by climate change’s extreme weather. It’s not near the full amount of $1.3 trillion that developing countries were asking for, but it’s three times a deal of $100 billion a year from 2009 that is expiring. Some delegations said this deal is headed in the right direction, with hopes that more money flows in the future.
It was not quite the agreement by consensus that these meetings usually operate with and developing nations were livid about being ignored.
COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev gaveled the deal into acceptance before any nation had a chance to speak. When they did they blasted him for being unfair to them, the deal for not being enough and the world’s rich nations for being too stingy.
“It’s a paltry sum,” India negotiator Chandni Raina said, repeatedly saying how India objected to rousing cheers. “I’m sorry to say we cannot accept it.”
She told The Associated Press that she has lost faith in the United Nations system.

After a deal, nations express their discontent
A long line of nations agreed with India and piled on, with Nigeria’s Nkiruka Maduekwe, CEO of the National Council on Climate Change, calling the deal an insult and a joke.
“I think we should rethink this. ... We have a right as countries to choose if we are to take this or not. And I am saying we do not accept this,” she said. “This is 3 a.m. and say ‘this is what we’re going to do,’ I don’t think so.”
The final package pushed through “does not speak or reflect or inspire confidence and trust that we will come out of this grave problem of climate change,” India’s Raina said. “The goal (of getting up to $300 billion by 2035) is too little, too distant. At 2035, it’s too far gone.”
“We absolutely object to the unfair means followed for adoption,” Raina said. “We are extremely hurt by this action by the president and the secretariat.”
Speaking for nearly 50 of the poorest nations of the world, Evans Davie Njewa of Malawi was more mild, expressing what he called reservations with the deal.
And UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a post on X that he hoped for a “more ambitious outcome.” But he said the agreement “provides a base on which to build.”
Some see deal as relief following tough talks
There were somewhat satisfied parties, with European Union’s Wopke Hoekstra calling it a new era of climate funding, working hard to help the most vulnerable.
But activists in the plenary hall could be heard coughing over Hoekstra’s speech in an attempt to disrupt it.
Eamon Ryan, Ireland’s environment minister, called the agreement “a huge relief.”
“It was not certain. This was tough,” he said. “Because it’s a time of division, of war, of (a) multilateral system having real difficulties, the fact that we could get it through in these difficult circumstances is really important.”
UN Climate Change’s Executive Secretary Simon Stiell called the deal an “insurance policy for humanity,” adding that like insurance, “it only works – if the premiums are paid in full, and on time.”
The deal is seen as a step toward helping countries on the receiving end create more ambitious targets to limit or cut emissions of heat-trapping gases that are due early next year. It’s part of the plan to keep cutting pollution with new targets every five years, which the world agreed to at the UN talks in Paris in 2015.
The Paris agreement set the system of regular ratcheting up climate fighting ambition as away to keep warming under 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. The world is already at 1.3 degrees Celsius (2.3 degrees Fahrenheit) and carbon emissions keep rising.
Hopes that more climate cash will follow
Countries also anticipate that this deal will send signals that help drive funding from other sources, like multilateral development banks and private sources. That was always part of the discussion at these talks — rich countries didn’t think it was realistic to only rely on public funding sources — but poor countries worried that if the money came in loans instead of grants, it would send them sliding further backward into debt that they already struggle with.
“The $300 billion goal is not enough, but is an important down payment toward a safer, more equitable future,” said World Resources Institute President Ani Dasgupta. “This deal gets us off the starting block. Now the race is on to raise much more climate finance from a range of public and private sources, putting the whole financial system to work behind developing countries’ transitions.”
And even though it’s far from the needed $1.3 trillion, it’s more than the $250 billion that was on the table in an earlier draft of the text, which outraged many countries and led to a period of frustration and stalling over the final hours of the summit.
Other deals agreed at COP29
The several different texts adopted early Sunday morning included a vague but not specific reference to last year’s Global Stocktake approved in Dubai. Last year there was a battle about first-of-its-kind language on getting rid of the oil, coal and natural gas, but instead it called for a transition away from fossil fuels. The latest talks only referred to the Dubai deal, but did not explicitly repeat the call for a transition away from fossil fuels.
Countries also agreed on the adoption of Article 6, creating markets to trade carbon pollution rights, an idea that was set up as part of the 2015 Paris Agreement to help nations work together to reduce climate-causing pollution. Part of that was a system of carbon credits, allowing nations to put planet-warming gasses in the air if they offset emissions elsewhere. Backers said a UN-backed market could generate up to an additional $250 billion a year in climate financial aid.
Despite its approval, carbon markets remain a contentious plan because many experts say the new rules adopted don’t prevent misuse, don’t work and give big polluters an excuse to continue spewing emissions.
“What they’ve done essentially is undermine the mandate to try to reach 1.5,” said Tamara Gilbertson, climate justice program coordinator with the Indigenous Environmental Network. Greenpeace’s An Lambrechts, called it a “climate scam” with many loopholes.
With this deal wrapped up as crews dismantle the temporary venue, many have eyes on next year’s climate talks in Belem, Brazil.


Trump to impose sanctions on International Criminal Court

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Trump to impose sanctions on International Criminal Court

Trump to impose sanctions on International Criminal Court
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump will sign an executive order on Thursday to sanction the International Criminal Court for targeting the United States and its allies, such as Israel, a White House official said.
The order will place financial and visa sanctions on individuals and their family members who assist in ICC investigations of US citizens or US allies, said the official.
The move by Trump comes after US Senate Democrats last week blocked a Republican-led effort to sanction the ICC in protest at its arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister over Israel’s campaign in Gaza. Netanyahu is currently visiting Washington.
The ICC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The court has taken measures to shield staff from possible US sanctions, paying salaries three months in advance, as it braced for financial restrictions that could cripple the war crimes tribunal, sources told Reuters last month.
In December, the court’s president, judge Tomoko Akane, warned that sanctions would “rapidly undermine the Court’s operations in all situations and cases, and jeopardize its very existence.”
This is the second time the court has faced US retaliation as a result of its work. During the first Trump administration in 2020, Washington imposed sanctions on then-prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and one of her top aides over the ICC’s investigation into alleged war crimes by American troops in Afghanistan.
The 125-member ICC is a permanent court that can prosecute individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and the crime of aggression against the territory of member states or by their nationals. The United States, China, Russia and Israel are not members.

Finland to ban Russian nationals from buying property: minister

Finland to ban Russian nationals from buying property: minister
Updated 06 February 2025
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Finland to ban Russian nationals from buying property: minister

Finland to ban Russian nationals from buying property: minister
  • “The government has just decided to submit a proposal to parliament to ban real estate transactions by Russians in Finland,” Finnish Defense Minister Antti Hakkanen said
  • “Our aim is to strengthen the security of Finland and the Finnish people“

HELSINKI: Finland’s government on Thursday proposed a ban on property purchases by nationals from countries that initiate wars, meaning in practice that real estate transactions by Russian citizens will be restricted.
It recommended that “persons whose country of nationality is waging a war of aggression and may pose a threat to Finland’s national security” would not be permitted to buy real estate there.
“The government has just decided to submit a proposal to parliament to ban real estate transactions by Russians in Finland,” Finnish Defense Minister Antti Hakkanen told a press conference.
“Our aim is to strengthen the security of Finland and the Finnish people,” he added.
While the bill did not mention Russia explicitly, Hakkanen said the current security environment meant “Russia and Russian nationals and companies are the ones concerned.”
Finland, which shares a 1,340-kilometer (830-mile) eastern border with Russia last year blocked several real estate acquisitions by private individuals and companies linked to Russia, citing threats to national security.
According to Hakkanen, the bill aims to prevent property being used for “large-scale hostile influence,” such as enabling intelligence activities and various forms of sabotage against Finland.
Persons holding a permanent residence permit in Finland or a long-term European Union residence permit granted by Finland would not be affected by the ban.
To reduce the risk that the ban will be circumnavigated by so-called dummy purchasers — someone who buys property on behalf of another to conceal the aim of a purchase — the ministry said it “could impose an obligation to apply for a permit.”
Parliament is set to vote on the bill later this spring, according to Hakkanen.


Panama president decries US ‘lies’ about canal fees

In this aerial view a cargo ship enters the Panama Canal on the Pacific Ocean side in Panama City on February 4, 2025. (AFP)
In this aerial view a cargo ship enters the Panama Canal on the Pacific Ocean side in Panama City on February 4, 2025. (AFP)
Updated 06 February 2025
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Panama president decries US ‘lies’ about canal fees

In this aerial view a cargo ship enters the Panama Canal on the Pacific Ocean side in Panama City on February 4, 2025. (AFP)
  • Allegations are latest point of tension between countries which have clashed over the canal since Trump claimed waterway had effectively been taken over by China

PANAMA CITY: Panama President Jose Raul Mulino on Thursday said the United States was spreading “lies and falsehoods” after the State Department claimed US government vessels would be able to pass the Panama Canal without paying a fee.
The fiery allegations are the latest point of tension between the two countries which have clashed over the canal since US President Donald Trump claimed the vital waterway had effectively been taken over by China and vowed “we’re taking it back.”
Speaking to journalists, Mulino expressed his “absolute rejection” of managing US-Panama ties “based on lies and falsehoods.”
The Panama Canal Authority issued a statement late on Wednesday denying the claim from the US State Department earlier in the day that Panama’s government had agreed to no longer charge crossing fees for US government vessels, in a move that would save the US millions of dollars a year.
Trump has accused the Central American country of charging excessive rates to use its trade passage, one of the busiest in the world.
“Why are they making an important institutional statement from the entity that governs the foreign policy of the United States, under the President of the United States, based on a falsehood?” Mulino asked on Thursday, calling the State Department’s claim “simply and plainly intolerable.”
Mulino said he had asked his ambassador in Washington to take “firm steps” to deny the Trump administration’s claim.


Four killed as US military-contracted plane crashes in Philippines

Four killed as US military-contracted plane crashes in Philippines
Updated 06 February 2025
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Four killed as US military-contracted plane crashes in Philippines

Four killed as US military-contracted plane crashes in Philippines
  • The Philippine military said in a statement it could not release information about the crash on Mindanao Island
  • None of the four known victims had so far been identified

MANILA: A small plane that crashed in the southern Philippines on Thursday, killing at least four people on board, was contracted by the American military, the US embassy confirmed without further detail.
The Philippine military said in a statement it could not release information about the crash on Mindanao Island as the matter was classified and an investigation was ongoing.
Small numbers of American troops are put on short-term rotational deployments in the Philippines, where the US military has helped provide intelligence to troops battling militants linked to the Daesh group that remain active on Mindanao.
The US Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii did not immediately respond to inquiries.
Regional police spokesman Jopy Ventura told AFP that officers had not yet determined the cause of the fixed-wing aircraft’s crash on a farm near the municipality of Ampatuan.
None of the four known victims had so far been identified, he said, adding that police and soldiers had been deployed to the site to prevent potential tampering with evidence.
The plane’s tail number, identified by police as N349CA, was registered to defense firm Metrea, according to flight-tracking site FlightAware, which identified it as a Beechcraft Super King Air B300.
The Metra website describes the company as a “leading provider of effects-as-a-service to national security partners across multiple domains and over a dozen mission areas.”
Municipal rescuer Rhea Martin told AFP her team had found four dead bodies at the crash site.
“The bodies were found near the plane,” she told AFP, adding: “The plane was cut in half.”


Police probe school link in Sweden’s worst mass shooting

Police probe school link in Sweden’s worst mass shooting
Updated 06 February 2025
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Police probe school link in Sweden’s worst mass shooting

Police probe school link in Sweden’s worst mass shooting
  • Swedish police found three rifles near the body of the gunman, who they believe took his own life
  • Syrian Arab Republic’s embassy in Stockholm wrote on Facebook that Syrian citizens were among the dead

OREBRO, Sweden: A gunman who killed 11 people, including himself, at an adult education center in central Sweden may have been a student at the school, police said on Thursday, as they described chaotic scenes after the country’s deadliest mass shooting as being like an “inferno.”
Police believe the suspected killer — identified by a Reuters source and Swedish media as Rickard Andersson, a 35-year-old unemployed recluse — acted alone in Tuesday’s attack on an educational campus in Orebro, about 200 km (125 miles) west of Stockholm.
Swedish police found three rifles near the body of the gunman, who they believe took his own life.
“The police who arrived at the scene have spoken about what could be described as an inferno ... dead people and injured people, screams and smoke,” Orebro police chief Lars Wiren said.
Police found 10 empty bullet magazines and a “large amount” of unused ammunition. Wiren said police arrived on the scene five minutes after the alarm was raised and believed the attacker then began directing his fire toward them.
“After approximately one hour, the acute operation was over when the suspected perpetrator was found dead with several weapons near him,” Wiren said, adding that police had not opened fire during the incident.
Police said the smoke was not caused by fire but by “some sort of pyrotechnics.” Several police had to seek medical attention for inhaling smoke.

’NO CLEAR MOTIVE’
Swedish authorities have said there was no evidence so far that the shooter, who was not previously known to police, had “ideological motives.”
“We don’t see a clear motive, but we’re looking for it,” police investigations leader Anna Bergqvist said. “It’s a very difficult question, but it’s really important for all of us to be able to present a motive as soon as possible.”
Police said in a statement that there was information indicating that he had been a student at the school. “That is something we will have to look closer at,” Bergqvist told the press conference.
Police have not confirmed the name of the suspect and are awaiting genetic, dental and fingerprint data before making a conclusive identification.
The Risbergska adult education center, where the attack took place, offers adult courses and Swedish language classes for immigrants.
While police have yet to disclose the identities of the victims, Syrian Arab Republic’s embassy in Stockholm wrote on Facebook that Syrian citizens were among the dead, without specifying how many. Bosnia’s foreign ministry said separately its embassy had been informed by relatives that one Bosnian citizen had been killed and another wounded in the attack.
Sweden has a high level of gun ownership by European standards, mainly linked to hunting, though it is much lower than in the United States. A wave of gang crime in recent years has also highlighted the high incidence of illegal weapons.
BARRICADED IN CLASSROOMS
While Sweden has suffered a wave of gun violence in recent years related to gang crime, the nation has been shocked by the brutality of Tuesday’s crime.
Survivors barricaded themselves in classrooms and hid under beds to escape the killer. When they were released by police, they spoke of seeing pools of blood where victims had been shot. Police are still working to formally identify the dead.
Six people were admitted to a local hospital in the wake of the attack, five of whom required surgery for gunshot wounds. All were now in stable condition though two remained in intensive care, regional authorities said in a statement.
Many students in Sweden’s adult school system are immigrants seeking qualifications to help them find jobs in the Nordic country, while also learning Swedish.
The Campus Risbergska school has around 2,700 pupils, around 800 of whom were enrolled in Swedish for Immigrants courses, according to information provided by the local authority.
Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, who called the attack a “dark day” for Sweden, was holding a regular gathering of the government on Thursday and has invited all the opposition parties to attend in a show of political unity.
Unlike in many countries, access to schools in Sweden is generally not tightly controlled. Speaking to Swedish Radio, School Minister Lotta Edholm, said that should change.