UN climate summit COP31 begins in Türkiye
The conference runs through Nov. 20, with a leaders' summit on Nov. 11-12 and Australia's Chris Bowen leading negotiations.
Governments and climate campaigners gathered in Antalya, Türkiye, on Monday as the UN climate summit COP31 began, Turkey's state-run news agency Anadolu Agency reported.
The talks, which run from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20, bring together national leaders, ministers, negotiators, scientists and representatives of civil society to discuss cutting emissions, adapting to climate change and raising money.
Türkiye is hosting the conference as its president, while Australian Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen will lead the negotiations on behalf of the talks.
A World Leaders' Summit is set for Nov. 11-12, during the first half of the two-week meeting.
The summit is organized around the slogan "COP of the Future – COP of Implementation," and its aim is to make existing climate promises produce measurable outcomes.
The Turkish presidency's action agenda puts priority on clean energy and electrification, zero waste, methane reduction, climate-resilient cities, green industry, food security and the protection of oceans and seas.
Proposed targets for 2035 include lifting electricity's share of global final energy use to 35 percent, cutting energy use in buildings by at least 25 percent and raising the global circular material use rate to at least 15 percent.
Negotiators have not yet agreed on how to pay for climate action in developing countries or how quickly to move away from fossil fuels, a gap that persisted after COP30 ended without an agreed roadmap.
The UN Environment Programme's 2026 Emissions Gap Report warned that global warming could reach around 2.6C this century even if countries fully carry out their current pledges, well above the goals of the Paris Agreement.
The same report estimates that developing countries will need about $305 billion a year for climate adaptation by 2035, while international public adaptation finance stood at $28.2 billion to $31.7 billion in 2024.
The summit follows a year of severe floods, deadly heat waves and long droughts, which have increased calls for faster emissions cuts and more financial support for vulnerable nations.
