First posted on Instagram
The 31st United Nations climate conference opens in Antalya, Türkiye, on Monday, November 9, under a leadership arrangement never tried before in the nearly 30-year history of the talks — and the two countries sharing the job already disagree over who has the final say. Türkiye holds the COP presidency and hosts the summit, while Australia’s climate minister, Chris Bowen, serves as President of Negotiations, with authority over the negotiated outcomes.
The split was the price of ending a deadlock. Türkiye and Australia both bid to host COP31, and with the host chosen by consensus, neither side would withdraw. The compromise, agreed at COP30 in Belém, Brazil, gives Türkiye the presidency, the World Leaders’ Summit and the action agenda that runs alongside the formal talks, while Bowen leads the negotiations, including setting the agenda, drafting text and appointing co-facilitators. Australia also led a pre-COP meeting in Fiji and Tuvalu in early October to narrow differences before Antalya.
The disagreement over the final say has been public for months. In April, Türkiye’s environment minister and COP31 President Murat Kurum said Türkiye would “play a role anywhere, everywhere, because Turkey is the COP31 president,” adding that “at the end of the day, the decisions will be taken by the COP31 Presidency.” In September he stressed that “Turkey is not co-chairing COP31 with Australia” and that the final decision rests with the presidency — a reading at odds with Australia’s understanding that Bowen holds exclusive authority over the negotiations. Anna Pérez Català of the Paris-based IDDRI policy think tank said the shared leadership model “has no precedent” at UN climate summits, and its success is not guaranteed.
The talks run from November 9 to 20 at the Antalya EXPO Center, with 197 countries taking part, and carry a heavy load of unfinished business from Belém: tripling adaptation finance, launching a just transition mechanism for workers and communities moving away from fossil fuels, and delivering the Baku-to-Belém roadmap toward $1.3 trillion a year in climate finance by 2035. The conference also opens the second cycle of the Global Stocktake. The United Nations frames the summit as a test of whether multilateralism still delivers, with current policies putting the world on track for about 2.8°C of warming above pre-industrial levels. A record El Niño — which NOAA gives an 83 percent chance of being the strongest since 1950 — adds urgency to an agenda already crowded with deferred decisions.
Both hosts bring fossil-fuel baggage to a summit meant to move the world away from fossil fuels. Türkiye generates a large share of its electricity from coal, and at COP30 it opposed accelerating the implementation of the transition away from fossil fuels; Australia is one of the world’s biggest coal exporters. The Turkish presidency has set a “35x35” goal — raising electricity’s share of final worldwide energy demand to 35 percent by 2035 — while Australia’s priority list includes giving Pacific island nations, low-lying and intensely vulnerable to climate change, a voice at the summit.
Leaders, scientists and negotiators are gathering to close the gap between promises and delivery — from methane cuts to climate-resilient cities and finance that actually reaches the people who need it most. With the presidency itself divided, the question hanging over Antalya is whether the two hosts can agree on what the summit is supposed to deliver before the talks even begin.