PM Shehbaz Sharif has been nominated vice chairman for the upcoming conference in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will act as the vice chairman for the upcoming United Nations climate change conference that is scheduled to take place in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, this week.
The Conference of Party – or COP27 – will bring together international officials, climate change experts and civil society activists from across the world and will be chaired by Egypt. According to the official sources, the prime minister was invited to co-chair COP27 by Egypt’s President Abdul Fattah El-Sisi since Sharif ran an international campaign to raise awareness about climate change in the wake of the recent floods in his country.
The Pakistani premier minister will jointly chair the conference with the Egyptian president and the prime minister of Norway. After the recent floods, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif raised an effective voice on climate change at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Council of Heads of State and Government and the 77th Session of the United Nations General Assembly.
Recent Floods
The recent floods in Pakistan were triggered by torrential monsoon rains which started in June and lasted for almost three months. The erratic weather pattern was widely attributed to the challenge of global climate change and claimed about 1,700 lives and affected 33 million people. The country lost billions of dollars after the floods destroyed houses, farmlands, livestock and other public infrastructure.
What is COP
COP stands for ‘Conference of the Parties, which is a generic phrase in International Relations-speak meaning a committee created after an international treaty is signed, tasked with making decisions about how that treaty is implemented.
There are all kinds of COPs for various international agreements, from chemical weapons to combating desertification. But the term COP has come to be associated with the meetings of one particular committee; that was created after the signing of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Forests explainer video still – thermometer
As many as -154 countries signed the UNFCCC in June 1992, agreeing to combat harmful human impacts on the climate. Since then, COP meetings have been held (almost) annually to discuss how exactly that should be achieved, and monitor what progress has been made. Each COP is usually referred to by its number in the series, e.g. COP26 was the 26th COP meeting.
Who is involved in COP?
Politicians, diplomats, and representatives of national governments are perhaps the most important people invited to COP, but they’re far from the only ones. Many other people attend to try to influence the outcome.
