COP21 Paris

This could potentially derail a legally binding agreement from being reached at the United Nations Conference of the Parties on Climate Change or COP21, currently underway in Paris.

Speaking to a packed press conference at the COP21 summit here on 3 December, PM Sopoaga said that while he appreciated statements made by world leaders during the COP21 plenary sessions, progress was still “painfully slow” and had resulted in little progress in Paris, much like other COP meetings in Durban, Doha, Warsaw and Lima.

Economists at Barclays estimate that greenhouse gas pledges made by the US, the EU, China, India, and others for the COP-21 climate summit amount to an epic change in the allocation of capital and resources, with financial winners and losers to match.