COP28: Loss and damage, fossil fuels and the limits of climate diplomacy

Abstract

The 2023 COP28 climate conference produced the first global stocktake of progress toward the objectives of the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), including its aim of preventing “dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system,” and subsequent protocols, notably the 2015 Paris Agreement and its intent to limit global warming to “well below” 2̊C-ideally 1.5̊C-and to help poor countries affected by climate change [1]. The stocktake revealed the extent to which international diplomacy and governance have failed to prevent the advancing climate crisis.