Pelosi: many Republicans assume local weather disaster is a “hoax”
Oliver Milman
Nancy Pelosi, the Home speaker, has appeared at Cop27, telling an occasion it’s “laborious to talk” concerning the midterm elections within the US, which might nonetheless see Republicans take slim management of the chamber.
Pelosi, carrying a US and Ukraine flag pin, stated that Democrats and Republicans have had “as you’ll say a disagreement on this challenge, all of them say it’s a hoax and we’ve received to get previous that. That is pressing, that is overdue”.
She added: “We’ve got to save lots of all the kids, it’s an ethical challenge. We will’t have political disagreements over this or let the fossil gas trade cramp our model. The necessity is nice sufficient and the urgency is obvious sufficient.”
Pelosi wouldn’t dwell on the midterms, which might oust her from her speaker position, however did lament that the US chartered two flights for lawmakers to move to the talks in Egypt, however discovered little curiosity because of the elections.
It’s possible Republican management of the Home would stymie any additional local weather payments or local weather funding for creating international locations. Kathy Castor, chair of the Home subcommittee on the local weather disaster, spoke alongside Pelosi and stated Republicans would “nix” the committee ought to they achieve energy.
Key occasions
Ruth Michaelson
Khaled Ali, the lawyer of imprisoned British-Egyptian starvation striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah, stated that he has arrived on the jail the place Abd el-Fattah was held however was denied entry to go to him.
Ali has been unable to get entry to see Abd el-Fattah since early 2020, when the British-Egyptian democracy activist was detained with out cost following a spate of anti-corruption demonstrations in Egypt.
The veteran human rights lawyer and former Egyptian presidential candidate stated earlier at present that he was all of a sudden knowledgeable by Egypt’s public prosecutor that his repeated requests to go to his consumer in detention had been granted, and he instantly set off for the desert jail two hours outdoors of Cairo.
When he arrived, he says he was told by guards that the prosecutor’s permission dated from final evening, and that he’s required to have permission to enter from the identical day.
Abd el-Fattah was sentenced final 12 months with “spreading false information,” for sharing a social media submit about torture, though Ali and his different defence attorneys weren’t given entry to his case file previous to the ruling, which noticed Abd el-Fattah imprisoned for an additional 5 years.
A figurehead of the 2011 uprisings, Abd el-Fattah started a starvation strike in April in protest at his detention circumstances, amid rising calls for from British officers to achieve entry to him whereas incarcerated. Egypt has stonewalled these requests.
Following six months on starvation strike, Abd el-Fattah informed his household he would cease ingesting water on the day that COP27 in Sharm el Sheikh started. Earlier at present, jail officers informed his household that he had “undergone a medical intervention with the information of a judicial authority,” suggesting that he had been topic to both force-feeding or intravenous rehydration with out his consent, a type of torture.
Some meals for thought:
An fascinating video right here, the place activist Ulaiasi Tuikoro explains why loss and injury funds are essential for Fiji.
Ulaiasi Tuikoro, a younger activist from Fiji, who has been demonstrating at Cop27 stated loss and injury is “the whole lot about me”.
“I’ve misplaced so much. I’ve lived by means of many cyclones. It’s laborious to get better from that so for me loss and injury is the whole lot I’m.” Tuikoro stated not everyone seems to be paying their fair proportion and loss and injury would assist save “no matter now we have left”.
“Within the Pacific we’ve received this tradition of not desirous to complain so much, however we’re not complaining, we’re demanding our place and survival.
“We’ve got tears of resilience […] and are pleading to our world leaders to save lots of what we will.”
In Fiji, the local weather disaster means dozens of villages might quickly be underwater. Kate Lyon’s writes on easy methods to transfer a rustic.
In our morning information assembly (interrupted considerably by the shaky wifi within the Cop convention centre), we mentioned how the negotiations had been creating, and what we would count on on the finish. Now Simon Evans, the extremely professional deputy editor at Carbon Temporary, has posted that “consultations on the all-important ‘cowl textual content’ received’t start till Saturday”, in accordance with the Cop presidency briefing.
The Guardian’s setting editor, Fiona Harvey, wrote concerning the particulars of the Cop26 Glasgow Local weather Pact on the time.
Please do ship ideas or inquiries to me, Natalie Hanman, head of setting on the Guardian: natalie.hanman@theguardian.com or @nataliehanman. I’ll be on the weblog for the following few hours. Thanks.
Our image editors have chosen a number of the finest pictures taken thus far at Cop at present.
Telling tales by means of photos is a vital a part of the Guardian’s journalism, and plenty of analysis exhibits the facility of pictures to outline how the local weather emergency “is known and acted upon”. Our head of images, Fiona Shields, has written about that beforehand right here.
What’s occurred at Cop27 thus far at present
I’m signing off for the afternoon and my colleague Natalie Hanman is taking on to information you thru occasions into this night.
It’s been a vibrant day thus far at Cop27 and there will probably be extra information to come back, so keep tuned to Natalie’s updates.
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There’s a file variety of fossil gas lobbyists at Cop this 12 months. There are 600 of them, a rise of greater than 25% on final 12 months and so they outnumber anyone frontline group affected by the local weather disaster.
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Clearly, protesters are usually not blissful about this and referred to as for the “felony” fossil gas representatives to be booted out of Cop.
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Some UK politicians made the rounds, with internet zero tsar Chris Skidmore becoming in at least six occasions. The enterprise secretary, Grant Shapps, was there, too, answering questions on UK oil and fuel exploration, and the Cop26 president Alok Sharma addressed a few panels.
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My colleague Damian Carrington introduced us two items of excellent information; first that Israel, Lebanon and Iraq have teamed as much as cut back emissions, and that Norway is shutting down plans for a big oilfield.
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The US speaker, Nancy Pelosi, made some somewhat extraordinary feedback by which she stated Republican politicians consider local weather breakdown is a “hoax”.
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Guardian reporter Nina Lakhani spent a lot of the day with protesters, who had been carrying white in solidarity with murdered and jailed setting defenders all over the world. Egypt is chargeable for a number of of these imprisonments, notably the starvation striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah. My different colleague Ruth Michaelson reported that his lawyer managed to safe a go to with Abd el-Fattah at present, who, it has been rumoured, was lately force-fed.
Have an awesome remainder of the afternoon; our crew will probably be reporting from Cop for the length, with a day by day reside weblog and plenty of information tales to maintain you updated on all of the developments.
It’s the youthful folks on this planet who will bear the brunt of a lot of the local weather emergency. Many world leaders are at an age the place they’ll most likely not be alive by 2050, the web zero emissions goal.
So at present is Youth Day at Cop27, and youth local weather activists and practitioners have taken place in a spherical desk with delegates from across the globe.
One younger one that was not seen at present is Greta Thunberg, who has stated she won’t be attending the “greenwashing” summit.
“The Cops are primarily used as a possibility for leaders and folks in energy to get consideration, utilizing many various sorts of greenwashing,” she stated earlier this autumn.
Nikhita Chulani
We’ve been listening to a number of debates about what precisely loss and injury is.
Ulaiasi Tuikoro, a youth activist from Fiji, who has been demonstrating at Cop27, says “it’s the whole lot about me”.
“I’ve misplaced so much. I’ve lived by means of many cyclones. It’s laborious to get better from that so for me loss and injury is the whole lot I’m.”
Tuikoro says that not everyone seems to be paying their fair proportion for the injustices they’ve perpetuated and that loss and injury will assist save “no matter now we have left”.
“Within the Pacific we’ve received this tradition of not desirous to complain so much, however we’re not complaining, we’re demanding our place and survival.
“We’ve got tears of resilience and our pleading to our world leaders to save lots of what we will.”
In Fiji, the local weather disaster means dozens of villages might quickly be underneath water. Relocating so many communities is an epic enterprise. However now there’s a plan.
Learn my colleague Kate Lyon’s piece on easy methods to transfer a rustic.
Uncommon excellent news – Norwegian oil discipline shuts down
Damian Carrington
It’s laborious to search out excellent news on the local weather disaster at Cop27 and particularly on maintaining fossil fuels within the floor, as scientists have repeatedly stated should occur. However most delegates right here will probably be cheered by the information that Norway’s oil firm has postponed improvement of the world’s most northerly oilfield exploitation.
The Wisting discipline could be a $10bn venture, however has been placed on ice for 4 years. The corporate blamed a “value improve on account of elevated international inflation” and “uncertainty concerning the framework circumstances for the venture”. Campaigners claimed the transfer as a victory.
Equinor has been underneath strain in Norway over the venture and the sector might now by no means be exploited, with some analysts anticipating oil demand to peak quickly.
Arild Hermstad, chief of Norway’s Inexperienced celebration, informed the Guardian: “We’re celebrating the excellent news at present. However so long as the Norwegian authorities doesn’t make a political announcement to cease all new exploration, our credibility as a local weather chief on the ongoing local weather talks in Egypt is nonexistent.”
Tessa Khan, director of Uplift, stated:
“Even when Equinor places the choice right down to rising prices, it is a victory for the local weather. Equinor spends so much on PR telling people who it’s transitioning away from oil and fuel, however in actuality it’s planning to develop large new oil and fuel initiatives.”
UN secretary basic, António Guterres, informed Cop27 on Tuesday: “Utilizing bogus ‘internet zero’ pledges to cowl up huge fossil gas enlargement is reprehensible. This poisonous coverup might push our world over the local weather cliff.”
Pelosi: many Republicans assume local weather disaster is a “hoax”
Oliver Milman
Nancy Pelosi, the Home speaker, has appeared at Cop27, telling an occasion it’s “laborious to talk” concerning the midterm elections within the US, which might nonetheless see Republicans take slim management of the chamber.
Pelosi, carrying a US and Ukraine flag pin, stated that Democrats and Republicans have had “as you’ll say a disagreement on this challenge, all of them say it’s a hoax and we’ve received to get previous that. That is pressing, that is overdue”.
She added: “We’ve got to save lots of all the kids, it’s an ethical challenge. We will’t have political disagreements over this or let the fossil gas trade cramp our model. The necessity is nice sufficient and the urgency is obvious sufficient.”
Pelosi wouldn’t dwell on the midterms, which might oust her from her speaker position, however did lament that the US chartered two flights for lawmakers to move to the talks in Egypt, however discovered little curiosity because of the elections.
It’s possible Republican management of the Home would stymie any additional local weather payments or local weather funding for creating international locations. Kathy Castor, chair of the Home subcommittee on the local weather disaster, spoke alongside Pelosi and stated Republicans would “nix” the committee ought to they achieve energy.
Ruth Michaelson
The household of the jailed British-Egyptian political prisoner and starvation striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah say that jail authorities knowledgeable them he has “undergone a medical intervention with the information of a judicial authority”.
Abd el-Fattah’s mom, the activist Laila Soueif, was prevented from ready outdoors Wadi al-Natrun jail the place the democracy activist is believed to be held for a fourth day, because the Egyptian authorities refuse to offer additional data or permit communication between the jailed democracy activist and his household.
His household stated:
Wadi al-Natrun jail officers at present refused to permit Laila Soueif to attend on the jail gates. They refused to take receipt of a letter she had written to the jail governor and one to Alaa. They knowledgeable her that Alaa had “undergone a medical intervention with the information of a judicial authority”. We’re demanding data on the substance of the “medical intervention” and demanding that with the utmost urgency he’s moved to a hospital the place attorneys and household can attain him. Figures from the revered al-Nadim Centre for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence places the variety of prisoners who’ve died in Egypt’s prisons this 12 months alone at 40 prisoners. The most recent was Ala al-Salmi, 47, who died in Badr 3 jail on the finish of October. Mr al-Salmi had been on starvation strike.
The assertion from the jail authorities suggests Abd el-Fattah has both been pressured fed, pressured to simply accept intravenous fluids or one other type of medical therapy he didn’t consent to, following six months of starvation strike and a water strike that he started on the day Cop27 commenced in Sharm el-Sheikh. His sister, Sanaa Seif, who’s attending Cop27, informed the Guardian earlier this week that “force-feeding is torture, and nothing ought to occur that’s towards Alaa’s will”.
The creator Omar Robert Hamilton, Abd el-Fattah’s cousin, stated: “This information is critically worrying. I’m not comforted in any respect and consider he’s nonetheless at huge threat. The Egyptian authorities are completely opaque, merciless, incompetent, corrupt and so paralysed by worry that data doesn’t journey alongside chains of command correctly – so something might occur. After being on starvation strike for seven months Alaa’s physique is in an extremely precarious state and the fallacious intervention might have horrible penalties. That is towards his will, unlawful and inhumane. We don’t even know if he’s in a hospital or nonetheless contained in the jail. The cruelty is unfathomable.”
His lawyer Khaled Ali stated that he was all of a sudden granted entry to go to him Wadi al Natrun jail for the primary time.
Ali tweeted that he’s presently en path to the jail to go to the activist after receiving permission to take action from Egypt’s public prosecutor. All of Ali’s earlier requests have been denied or ignored, whereas Egyptian officers have stonewalled ongoing efforts by British consular officers to get entry to the campaigner, after repeatedly failing to recognise his twin nationality.
For these eager about what the UK authorities is as much as, Cop-wise, I acquired this from setting secretary Thérèse Coffey’s crew:
She goes to Cop searching for to take care of the momentum we began at Cop26 by championing nature-based options. She’ll be holding bilaterals and becoming a member of occasions to name for formidable pledges to be met with formidable motion.
She will probably be there from Monday till Wednesday. Nevertheless, it could be troublesome for her to command respect on the bilaterals contemplating she very lately admitted to breaching the federal government’s personal Atmosphere Act by lacking the deadline to submit clear air and water targets. Maybe getting these out within the open may very well be a “nature-based answer”.
Activists spotlight jailed and murdered setting and human rights defenders
Nina Lakhani
Gloria Ocampo, Berta Caceres, Marielle Franco, Liliana Peña Chocué, Macarena Valdés, Amaya Morales – just some of the 1000’s of murdered environmental and human rights defenders whose names had been learn on the largest and most emotive protest at Cop27 thus far.
A few hundred folks gathered carrying white garments in solidarity with the murdered and jailed defenders all over the world who put their our bodies on the road to save lots of the planet, however whose voices are lacking from Cop27 and the broader struggle for local weather and social justice. Every particular person’s title was adopted by an emotive shout of “not but defeated”.
The sobering title name was adopted by half a minute of silence, after which audio system from the US, Malaysia, Philippines, South Africa and occupied first nation land in what’s often known as Canada, referred to as out the UNFCCC and nation states for pushing market-driven options whereas denying frontline communities a seat on the desk.
“Cease mendacity to the folks. Transfer away from carbon credit and different false options,” stated Siawatu-Salama Ra from Michigan. “It isn’t a criminal offense to need reasonably priced secure water or clear air to breathe. Free all prisoners, free all of them, free him, free him,” she stated, apparently referring to the Egyptian-British jailed starvation striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah whose destiny is unknown.
A few of the largest cheers got here in the course of the impassioned speech from 29-year-old Zukiswa White from South Africa, who related dots between the wealth of the wealthy international north and the degradation and poverty of the worldwide south. “We’re nonetheless paying for his or her improvement, as if their international locations weren’t constructed off of our backs. We don’t must know easy methods to take care and nurture our land from those that have destroyed and degraded our land, tradition and heritage. That’s the reason we’re right here at Cop27. If we maintain transferring within the logic of white supremacy and racist improvement initiatives, our youngsters will probably be right here at Cop100.”
White learn out a quote from Fikile Ntshangase, a South African activist who fought towards a coal mine: “I refused to signal, I can not promote out my folks. If want be, I’ll die for my folks.” Fikile Ntshangase was murdered in 2020.
Israel, Lebanon and Iraq crew as much as deal with international heating
Damian Carrington
In a uncommon instance of local weather change considerations taking precedence over political hostility, Israel, Lebanon and Iraq have agreed together with different nations to work collectively to deal with international heating, in accordance with the New Arab web site and different studies.
Israel remains to be formally at struggle with Lebanon and bans its residents from having any contact with Israelis, whereas Israel and Iraq haven’t any diplomatic relations on account of a historical past of hostilities.
“The international locations of the area share the warming and drying local weather and simply as they share the issues they will and should share the options. No nation can stand alone within the face of the local weather disaster,” stated Tamar Zandberg, Israel’s outgoing environmental safety minister.
Nevertheless, the workplace of Lebanon’s prime minister Najib Mikati, performed down any wider significance of the assembly at Cop27, saying it was attended by a lot of Arab and worldwide officers: “There was no contact in anyway with any Israeli official.”
The Haaretz newspaper stated that, in accordance with sources, that is the primary high-level regional assembly on local weather change that Israel is participating in.
Israel and Jordan additionally signed a memorandum of understanding at Cop27 to maneuver forward with their water-for-energy deal, first introduced a 12 months in the past. Within the proposal, Jordan will construct 600 megawatts of solar energy capability to export electrical energy to Israel in alternate for 200 million cubic meters of desalinated water.
An excellent image right here of everybody carrying white in solidarity with murdered land defenders and political prisoners. British-Egyptian jailed starvation striker Alaa Abd el-Fattah is within the ideas of many on the protest. The 40-year-old pro-democracy author and activist has been behind bars in Egypt for many of the previous decade. His buddy, the actor Khalid Abdalla, who performs Dodi Fayed in Netflix present The Crown, posted the images and stated: “If solely Alaa might see this”.
In case you’ve time to observe this – or bookmark it for elevenses – our glorious Fiona Harvey has fronted a Guardian documentary about Cop27. She’s arguably one of many main Cop specialists on this planet and has glorious insights, in addition to contacts. She offers an outline of the final 30 years of Cops, and asks presidents, international leaders, activists and scientists if international diplomacy is sufficient to save humanity from the brink of annihilation.
The Cop26 president Alok Sharma’s had a busy morning, talking at two completely different occasions, one on decarbonising schooling and one other on the UK pavilion about how companies can hit local weather targets.
He stated: “Companies proceed to step up work and ambition to make 1.5C a actuality.”