Heated negotiations on a global climate deal were set to spill into today after developing nations, including Fiji rejected an initial US$250 billion offer from rich countries to help them tackle global warming.
COP29 hosts Azerbaijan said negotiations would drag “over the course of the night” in the Caspian Sea city Baku to produce a final text.
This will be put before nearly 200 nations for consensus approval today.
The rejected proposal raised an existing commitment of US$100 billion a year from rich nations but fell well short of what experts say developing nations need.
The Alliance of Small Island States, for which climate change is an existential threat, said the offer showed “contempt for our vulnerable people”.
Ali Mohamed, chair of the African Group of Negotiators, another influential bloc imperilled by climate disaster, called the proposal “totally unacceptable and inadequate”.
“US$250 billion will lead to unacceptable loss of life in Africa and around the world, and imperils the future of our world,” he said.
A group of 134 developing states including China had demanded at least US$500 billion towards the cost of building resilience against climate change and reducing planet-warming emissions.
