Cop31 host: spend 'much more' on climate than on defense — SkimNews
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- Murat Kurum, Turkey's climate minister and Cop31 president-designate, said NATO countries should spend "much more" on climate than the 5% of GDP they have pledged for defense by 2035, calling climate "the security issue itself" because pre-disaster spending is cheaper than post-disaster recovery.
- Kurum hedged on whether Cop31 should repeat the Cop28 "transition away from fossil fuels" language, saying the world was "already in a transition" and suggesting further progress might not be productive.
- Both host countries — Turkey and Australia — backed a joint Fiji statement supporting a global transition away from fossil fuels, while facing accusations of hypocrisy for continuing to back new coal and gas developments.
- A UN Environment Programme report warned global heating would reach at least 1.8C under the most optimistic future, well beyond the Paris agreement's 1.5C ceiling, and called for immediate sustained emissions cuts.
- Australia's Chris Bowen said only 0.2% of global climate finance currently reaches small island developing states, calling that gap a key Cop31 priority.
- Kurum and Bowen said Cop31 will push for 35% of energy used by homes, businesses, factories, and vehicles to come from electricity by 2035, up from roughly 21% today.
- Dozens of frustrated countries met in Colombia this year to discuss a path away from fossil fuels and plan to reconvene in Tuvalu next July to push a phaseout into the Antalya agreement.
Why it matters: Both Cop31 hosts are championing climate ambition while continuing to back new fossil fuel projects — a contradiction Kurum's phaseout hedging makes harder to ignore. With the UN warning heating will hit at least 1.8C, the real Antalya fight is whether the final agreement will name fossil fuels directly, not whether defense budgets get redirected.
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