Diplomats Form 'Friends of Science' Bloc at Bonn Climate Talks
Diplomats from Fiji, Nepal, the European Union, Switzerland, Sierra Leone and Panama launched a 'Friends of Science' grouping at the Bonn climate talks to defend the role of climate science in United Nations negotiations. The bloc pledged to ensure that decisions under the UN climate process remain based on the best available science.
Fiji's lead negotiator Sivendra Michael told a press conference that anyone blocking references to science is not a friend, citing a rising polluted narrative inside and outside the negotiating rooms. Nepal negotiator Manjeet Dhakal said science indicates 1.5C is a hard limit for many countries, including small island developing states and least developed countries.
The grouping surfaced as the next UN global stocktake approaches. According to Climate Home News, the stocktake is due to start in November and end in 2028, with a long-standing dispute over whether the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment reports will be ready in time.
Context
The stocktake is the Paris Agreement mechanism for measuring collective progress on emissions cuts, adaptation, and finance, and its outcomes shape the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions. Sequencing the IPCC's next assessment cycle to feed into that process has been a recurring procedural fight, because parties that want to slow ambition can argue from older science if newer findings are not formally adopted in time.
The 1.5C threshold sits at the center of that fight. UN Secretary-General António Guterres conceded last year that a temporary breach of the warming limit is inevitable, while urging countries to redouble efforts to bring temperatures back down. Small island states and least developed countries treat the limit as existential, which is why Dhakal's framing of 1.5C as a hard limit lands as a negotiating red line rather than a target.
The makeup of the new bloc, pairing Pacific and Himalayan climate-vulnerable states with the EU and Switzerland, signals an attempt to lock in a science-based floor before the stocktake opens in November.
Source: climatechangenews.com (opens in a new tab)1 sourcePermalink