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US-China relations
ChinaDiplomacy
Shi Jiangtao
Shi Jiangtao

My Take | China’s role in spotlight as Cop28 climate talks in Dubai enter final phase

  • Beijing’s climate chief has denied that the country is blocking talks about whether to commit to ‘phasing out’ fossil fuel use
  • However, it has been in ‘intensive’ talks with the US about a deal, suggesting an agreement between the two countries may be a model

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A climate activist group has been accused of pulling its punches when it comes to China. Photo: AP
Shi Jiangtao
With just hours to go before the United Nations climate summit in Dubai was scheduled to end, there was some good news and some bad news.

The good news was China and the United States, the world’s top two polluters, had been in “intensive” talks over the past two weeks in the United Arab Emirates to find a climate deal “acceptable to all parties”, as China’s top negotiator Xie Zhenhua put it.

It shows despite their intensifying divisions, the rival powers can still work together on some of the most pressing issues when they want to.

The bad news is that such a deal still hangs in the air, at least at the time of writing. The biggest sticking point throughout the Dubai talks, known as Cop28, is about finding consensus among nearly 200 countries on cutting fossil fuel use, including coal.

The talks look set to run over time, as the US, Europe and low-lying island countries are angry at the draft deal released on Monday by the UAE scrapped calls for fossil fuel use to be “phased out”.

Saudi Arabia, other oil-rich countries and India have led the resistance to the idea – but China’s attitude is also critical to Cop28, which US climate negotiator John Kerry described as the “last” chance to keep temperature rises at 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

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