Good morning, it's Kasmira. Three years after endorsing a political declaration to refrain from bombing in populated areas, 88 countries are meeting in Costa Rica to review how their actions have measured up since then, even as urban warfare continues to wreak havoc in more countries than ever.
Health issues have reportedly brought Sudan's prime minister to Geneva. And my colleague Paula Dupraz-Dobias brings us her latest dispatches from Cop30 in Belém. |
moke rises from a fire after an explosion following an Israeli strike at Choueifat district in Beirut, Lebanon, 6 October 2024. (Keystone/EPA/Ugur Can)
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Entrance to the climate conference in Belém, 17 November 2025. (Geneva Solutions/Paula Dupraz-Dobias)
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🪖COP INS AND OUTS.
In Belém, while Indigenous activists protesting their exclusion from climate talks are being kept out of the venue by soldiers, fossil fuel lobbyists have had little trouble securing a place in the negotiations.
Last week, a group of Indigenous campaigners demanding a seat at the table for issues affecting them deeply, including mitigation, finance and carbon markets, broke into the restricted Blue Zone negotiating area.
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Influence capture.
More than 1,600 lobbyists representing the fossil fuel industry are estimated to have been accredited to the climate conference – roughly one in every 25 Cop30 attendees, according to the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition – setting a new record for the annual gathering.
That’s nearly twice the 900 Indigenous representatives registered to this year’s summit, according to figures by Cop30 executive director Ana Toni.
Of the lobbyists, over 550 represent carbon capture and storage, according to the Center for International Environmental Law, which says the technology is a “lifeline” for the fossil fuel industry to prolong and entrench its dominance.
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Lessons from health talks.
On Monday, civil society campaigners called for a WHO-style accountability and independence framework that excludes fossil fuel lobbyists from climate conferences – or at least requires their funding to be fully disclosed.
“The tobacco industry is not welcome at the WHO, and the fossil fuel industry should not be welcome at the UNFCCC (UN climate body – ed.),” David Tong of Oil Change International told us.
— Paula Dupraz-Dobias, reporting from Belém
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