COP24: Climate summit focuses on Paris Agreement rule book

By Lydia O'Kane

A series of technical talks got underway aimed at finalizing the rules that define the 2015 Paris agreement on curbing global warming. The diplomatic discussions come a day after U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made a dramatic appeal to governments to act boldly to avert a catastrophic rise in temperatures before the end of the century. 

Paris Agreement rule book

Attending the conference is the relief and development agency, Christian Aid which works with hundreds of local partner organisations in some of the world's most vulnerable communities.  Speaking from the summit in Katowice, Communications Manager for the charity, Joe Ware, explained more about this rule book, saying, “one of the big issues that’s being discussed here is creating the operating manual for the Paris Agreement, which was the big agreement signed in Paris in 2015… and so, we’re creating this rule book which will lay out and which will allow us to assess all the national pledges that different countries have put forward… So, this rule book is one of the crucial things they’re discussing and hopefully that will be something that will be signed at the end of this summit in two weeks.”

Dramatic warning on Climate Change

Speaking about the UN Secretary General’s powerful opening speech to the conference on Monday, Joe described it as, an emotional address. “You don’t usually get such emotion and such passion from the boss of the UN…and I think it reflects the fact that we have had this recent report from the World Scientists, the IPCC saying that we really are facing a potential crisis if we don’t accelerate this transition to a low carbon economy, he said.”

Despite the fact that US President Trump has announced that he will pull his country out of the Paris Accord, the Christian Aid Communications Manager noted that, “it has actually shown how strong the agreement is, because we assumed that as soon as America pulled out, China would pull out; Russia would pull out; all these other countries would take the opportunity to get out, but actually none of them have done…”

Christian Aid and advocacy

As an anti-poverty charity, Joe said that Christian Aid was at the COP24 summit to advocate on behalf of partner organisations and vulnerable communities who are severely affected by climate change. He went to say that sadly, “climate change is that ultimate injustice and that’s why we need a fair and equitable process that will deal with that problem.”