The divisions emerged during the United Nations (UN) General Assembly’s High-Level Week, where climate-vulnerable countries demanded faster action while energy producers supported more gradual transition pathways. “A future beyond fossil fuels is in sight. The question is how?” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said.
Guterres urged governments to adopt national transition plans with clear timelines and protection for affected workers and communities.
Pacific island countries issued some of the strongest calls for urgency as rising seas threatened territory, livelihoods and sovereignty.
“A much accelerated transition away from fossil fuels is the only logical response,” Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine said. “Continued investment in fossil fuels is not only immoral but irrational.”
Tuvalu called for a “fast, fair, just and orderly transition” alongside reductions in methane and carbon dioxide emissions.
However, several energy-producing countries warned that rapid changes could undermine affordability, jobs and economic development.
Nigeria rejected what Vice-President Kashim Shettima described as a “false choice between development and climate action”. Nigeria’s transition plan combines renewable energy and clean cooking with natural gas as a transitional fuel, targeting net-zero emissions by 2060.
Saudi Arabia called for realistic pathways that did not exclude energy sources, while Brazil pledged to continue oil exploration alongside decarbonisation.
Other countries presented the transition as an economic opportunity. Lesotho launched a Just Energy Transition Fund intended to expand renewable capacity, increase energy independence and create employment.
Portugal said renewables generated more than 70% of national electricity and brought forward the carbon-neutrality target to 2045.
Financing remained another major division.
Nepal called for grants rather than additional debt, warning that climate disasters repeatedly destroyed infrastructure and erased development gains. “Climate finance must not become a bureaucratic maze through which vulnerable countries spend years proving that they need help,” Nepal Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli said.
Seychelles said adaptation, emissions reduction, technology transfer and loss-and-damage financing were legal obligations rather than charitable support.
Small island countries also demanded recognition that statehood, borders and maritime rights would survive rising seas. “The sea does not negotiate. It does not read communiqués. And it does not recognise a veto,” Bahamas Prime Minister Philip Davis said.
Several leaders called for the next climate summit to focus on implementation. “We have the solutions. We know what is required. Now we need to deliver,” Denmark said.
–UN/ChannelAfrica–
