Pope calls for climate action as rich nations sound alarm

Leaders of the 20 richest countries will acknowledge the existential threat of climate change and will take urgent steps to limit global warming, a draft communique seen ahead of the COP26 summit shows.

As people around the world prepared to demonstrate their frustration with politicians, Pope Francis lent his voice to a chorus demanding action, not mere words, from the meeting that will start in Glasgow, Scotland, on Sunday.

The Group of 20, whose leaders gather on Saturday and Sunday in Rome beforehand, will pledge to take urgent steps to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

While the 2015 Paris Agreement committed signatories to keeping global warming to “well below” 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and preferably to 1.5 degrees, carbon levels in the atmosphere have since grown.

“We commit to tackling the existential challenge of climate change,” the G20 draft promised. “We recognize that the impacts of climate change at 1.5 degrees are much lower than at 2 degrees and that immediate action must be taken to keep 1.5 degrees within reach.”

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Friday that the world was rushing headlong toward climate disaster and G20 leaders must do more to help poorer countries.

“Unfortunately, the message to developing countries is essentially this: The check is in the mail. On all our climate goals, we have miles to go. And we must pick up the pace,” Guterres said.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is hosting COP26, said this week the outcome hangs in the balance.

Climate activist Greta Thunberg, who has berated politicians for 30 years of “blah, blah, blah” is among those who took to the streets of the City of London, the British capital’s financial heart, to demand the world’s biggest financial companies withdraw support for fossil fuel.

The 84-year-old pope will not attend COP26, following surgery earlier this year, but on Friday he led the calls for action at the talks that run from Oct. 31 to Nov. 12.

The world’s political leaders, he said, must give future generations “concrete hope” that they are taking the radical steps needed.

“These crises present us with the need to take decisions, radical decisions that are not always easy,” he said.

“Moments of difficulty like these also present opportunities, opportunities that we must not waste.”

The pope had a chance to raise his climate concerns at a meeting with US President Joe Biden in Rome.
The White House said Biden thanked the pope for “his advocacy for the world’s poor and those suffering from hunger, conflict, and persecution”.

Biden also praised the pope’s “leadership in fighting the climate crisis, as well as his advocacy to ensure the pandemic ends for everyone through vaccine sharing and an equitable global economic recovery”.

The Vatican said the two discussed “care of the planet,” healthcare, the pandemic, refugees, migrants, and “the protection of human rights, including freedom of religion and conscience”.

The Vatican said the private meeting lasted one hour and 15 minutes and then about another 15 minutes for picture taking and the exchange of gifts in the presence of other members of the delegation, including Biden’s wife, Jill.