UN Secretary-General António Guterres unleashed his fury on world powers at the Belem climate summit, accusing them of “deadly negligence” and “moral failure” in the face of a mounting climate crisis. His speech set a somber and confrontational tone for the gathering.
Guterres warned that allowing global warming to exceed the 1.5-degree Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) benchmark would be a catastrophic mistake. “Every fraction of a degree higher means more hunger, displacement and loss,” he warned, stressing that even a “temporary overshoot” would be devastating.
The UN chief’s anger was directed at a lack of global unity, exemplified by the absence of leaders from the top three polluting nations: the US, China, and India. He accused world powers of being “captive to the fossil fuel interests” instead of “protecting the public interest.”
In sharp contrast to this bleak assessment, Brazil’s President Lula da Silva put forward a constructive proposal. His “Tropical Forests Forever Facility” is a new $5.5 billion fund, financed by loans, to pay 74 nations to protect their rainforests.
The fund, backed by a $3 billion pledge from Norway, is a tangible solution. It also allocates 20 percent of its money to Indigenous peoples, offering a practical path forward amid Guterres’s dire warnings.