Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who is hosting the COP29 climate change summit this week, on Tuesday slammed Western media and climate change activists for criticizing the country's oil and gas industry.
Aliyev said Oil and gas are a “gift from God”, fossil fuels cannot be completely eliminated, and climate change extremists are subjecting Azerbaijan to a “well-organized campaign of smear and intimidation”.
Aliyev said all this in his keynote speech at the COP29 conference, infuriating many attendees, even though he said he was committed to a gradual transition away from carbon-emitting energy production.
“Of course, as President of COP29, we strongly advocate for a green transition and are implementing it. But at the same time, we have to be realistic,” he said.
Aliyev was unapologetic about the importance of fossil fuels to the national economy. Approximately 90 percent of Azerbaijan's exports are oil and gas products, and revenues from these industries provide 60 percent of government funding.
“Oil, gas, wind, sun, gold, silver and copper are all natural resources and countries should not be blamed for having them, nor should they be blamed for bringing these resources to market. “Because the market needs them,” he said.
“Please quote what I said, this is a gift from God, and I would like to repeat that to this audience today,” he said. declared.
Aliyev blamed “Western fake news” created a false impression about Azerbaijan's carbon footprint.
“The fake news media in this country, which is the world's largest oil and gas producer and produces 30 times more oil than Azerbaijan, calls us a 'petrostate'. They should look at themselves. Good,” he said. He was referring to the United States. generate It accounts for just under 15 percent of the world's crude oil, slightly more than Saudi Arabia.
Aliyev also had strong words against “so-called independent NGOs (non-governmental organizations)” and “some politicians” who are “competing to spread disinformation and false information about our country.” . He accused European politicians of hypocrisy for criticizing Azerbaijan's energy industry while purchasing Azerbaijani gas.
Mr. Aliyev's bellicose keynote speech was well-received by the COP29 audience, even though his basic point of prudent use of fossil fuels during a green energy “transition” was not out of the mainstream. It was considered completely heretical.
Immediately after Aliyev's speech, UN Secretary-General António Guterres took to the stage and denounced the “doubling of fossil fuels” as sacrilege.
“The sound you hear is the ticking of a clock. We are in the final countdown to limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, and time is not on our side.”
This was typical of Guterres' climate alarm rhetoric. Because even the much-touted Paris Agreement doesn't actually do that. I'll say anything On ticking clocks and firm climate targets – the widely touted 1.5 degrees 20 year average, It's not a doomsday deadline that's coming up in a year or two.
China, the world's worst polluter, has already admitted it will fall far short of meeting the Paris climate goals.
All countries outside the Western Alliance announced We will not compromise industrial challenges in the name of climate change. Mr. Aliyev is no more hardline than other leaders of developing countries, including the China-led BRICS allies. However, he simply showed a bad attitude by speaking out in a keynote speech at a climate change conference hosted by the country.
Sunday, Azerbaijan said it will be so increase It produced gas to meet the needs of the European Union, but refused to commit to climate change plans. Chief climate negotiator Yaltin Rafiyev insisted that Azerbaijan's plan to increase domestic dependence on clean energy from 1.5% to 30% should be sufficient.
Even before Aliyev spoke, many climate change activists were unhappy with the choice of Azerbaijan as the host country. Last week, the BBC reported About a “secret report” showing Elnur Soltanov, chief executive of Azerbaijan's COP29 team, discussing “investment opportunities” with a climate change activist posing as a natural gas investor.
“We have a lot of gas fields to develop,” Soltanov, Azerbaijan's deputy energy minister and director of state energy company SOCAR, said in the recording.
Rafiev declined to comment on Soltanov's video on Sunday, saying only that the team “will continue the negotiation process in a similar manner.”
