Cop25 fails the targets. UN, lost opportunity

(by Stefania De Francesco) - The Cop 25 closes with two extra days and avoids disaster. But not failure, according to environmentalists. What was supposed to be the ambitious UN climate change conference did not achieve its goals, despite the severe warning of science and the protests of Greta Thunberg and civil society around the world. There is no agreement and the solution of some nodes has been postponed to 2020.
In the more than two weeks of negotiations in Madrid, in what was the longest Conference of the parties (Cop) ever (started on December 2), there is a victory, albeit in half, and it is that of vulnerable countries, victims extreme weather events, some of which are likely to disappear, like the small islands of the Pacific. They have forced the richest countries to indicate by next year how much they will increase (and therefore no longer an option) by 2030 to cut greenhouse gases, at the origin of global warming and environmental disasters. It was a point not so formulated in the Paris Agreement of 2015. Now, it is clearly written and therefore at the Cop26 of November 2020 in Glasgow no country will be able to escape from indicating how much the national contribution (climate change) will increase. Only in this way will it be possible to understand if there is a gap between the commitments made and those necessary to contain the average increase in global temperature within 1.5 degrees by 2100 compared to the pre-industrial period. An increase that, according to science, can avoid extreme climatic phenomena. Next year will therefore be crucial to save the Paris Agreement. Italy is a partner with Scotland for the pre-Cop that will have an event dedicated to young people. The UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who had opened the Conference of the 196 countries plus the EU by pronouncing the word "ambition" three times, said he was "disappointed" with the result stating that "the international community has lost an important opportunity to show greater ambition ". In a tweet he urged: "We must not give up, and I will not give up". The tweet of Greta, the young Swedish activist who had also participated in some of the events of the Cop, stressing that governments do not seem to perceive the urgency and wondering how they could not panic: "The science is clear, but it is being ignored "Whatever happens, we won't give up. We've just started."
In the tug-of-war between rich and vulnerable countries, the result in favor of the poorest and weakest is however the result of a compromise arrived after 14 days of exhausting negotiations (in the last plenary the fatigue between errors and haste to take 'plane). The other crucial point was that of the revision of the aid for losses and damage (Loss and damage) which the vulnerable countries (also the least responsible for greenhouse gases) undergo, for which a resource effort is still required from the rich countries. It was decided to postpone to 2020 how the definition of the rules on the global carbon market was also postponed. Noting that "no concrete response from governments has arrived", Legambiente says that "Europe can and must reduce its emissions by at least 65% by 2030 compared to 1990 levels". According to the WWF, "the most polluting countries - including the United States, China, India, Japan, Brazil, Saudi Arabia - have shirked the responsibility of reducing greenhouse gas emissions" by continuing to "put their own interests before the global crisis" . 2020 "must be a turning point and we will fight even more for people and nature", said Mariagrazia Midulla, Head of Climate and Energy of WWF Italy. The outcome of this COP "is completely unacceptable" according to Greenpeace also for "the irresponsible weakness of the Chilean presidency". For Angello Bonelli of the Greens the Cop25 "sanctions an unprecedented criminal failure and puts the future of our planet at risk". (ANSA).