AFP
NOS News•
The chairman of the board of the largest oil company in the United Arab Emirates will lead the international climate conference COP28. The conference is in Dubai at the end of this year.
Sultan al-Jaber (49) has been the climate envoy of the Emirates for many years, and also heads the oil company Abu Dhabi National Oil, which now pumps out about 4 million barrels of crude oil a day. The company has expressed the ambition to make that 5 million. He also heads Masdar, a multinational company active in sustainable energy in dozens of countries.
In a statement to the state news agency of the Emirates, Al-Jaber said “this will be a critical year for climate action”, highlighting the country’s “strong sense of responsibility and high ambition” when it comes to climate change.
‘Alarming case of conflict of interest’
A spokesperson for activist group Climate Action Network called Al-Jaber’s appointment “an unprecedented and alarming case of conflict of interest. There should be no room for polluters at a climate conference.”
Each year, the country hosting the climate conference chooses the moderator, and the participating countries usually agree. According to experts, it matters a lot who leads the talks: the Briton Alok Sharma received good reactions to his – according to those present – energetic and ambitious performance in Glasgow in 2021. A year later, the performance of the Egyptian minister Shoukry in Sharm-el- Sheikh criticized as chaotic and opaque.
The 28th edition of the climate conference COP (‘Conference of the Parties’) will be held in Dubai this year from 30 November.
