(NEW YORK) — A self-portrait by the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo was sold for almost $35 million, including fees, at a Sotheby’s auction in New York on Tuesday.
This portrait, titled ‘Diego y yo’ (Diego and me), had been part of a private collection for almost 30 years.
Frida Kahlo was married to Mexican artist Diego Rivera, who previously held the record for the most expensive artwork from Latin America. Rivera’s ‘The Rivals,’ was sold for $9.76 million in a 2019 auction.
“People started unraveling the depth of Frida Kahlo’s art decades after her death,” Gannit Ankori, an art historian, curator and Kahlo expert, told ABC News.
During her lifetime, the Mexican artist was never able to make a living through her paintings, and only had two gallery shows while she was still alive, Ankori said.
The 1949 self-portrait — described by Sotheby’s as a “masterpiece” — depicts the artist gazing at the viewer, with a small portrait of Diego Rivera seen in her forehead as a “third eye.” ‘Diego y yo’ was painted during the same year as Kahlo’s then-husband Rivera started an alleged extramarital affair with actress Maria Felix.
“This painting is very similar and dissimilar to Frida Kahlo’s work during this decade,” Ankori said. It was not the only painting with Rivera seen on her forehead, but “the expression of such raw emotion and grief — seen in the loose swirling hair that almost strangles her and is uncontained by the picture frame, the facial features and the tears — are unique,” Ankori said.
The same painting was sold for the first time in 1990 at Sotheby’s for $1.43 million by a New York collector, the art broker said. Before that,’ Diego y yo’ was owned by a friend of the Mexican couple.
“You could call tonight’s result the ultimate revenge, but in fact, it is the ultimate validation of Kahlo’s extraordinary talent and global appeal,” Anna Di Stasi, Sotheby’s director for Latin American Art, said in a press release.
The buyer is Argentinian real estate businessman and collector Eduardo Costantini.
Costantini, 75, is also the founder of the MALBA, the Latin American Art Museum in Buenos Aires.
(WASHINGTON) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is running headfirst into a number of fires as he makes his first trip to Africa as America’s top diplomat.
Nearly 10 months into his tenure, Blinken will bring U.S. President Joe Biden’s “America’s back” mantra to the world’s youngest continent. But for years now, the United States has been playing catch-up to China in many of Africa’s 54 countries. China has promoted deep business and diplomatic ties and invested in infrastructure, while the U.S. has said next to nothing about the region’s democratic backsliding.
Millions of donated U.S. vaccine doses have helped boost American influence, but Blinken’s visit to promote that generosity and increased U.S. engagement will also be sidetracked by growing crises that have consumed the State Department’s attention — the worsening conflict in Ethiopia and the derailed democratic transition in Sudan.
Notably, he will skip Ethiopia — once a staple of secretary of state visits because it was one of the continent’s fastest-growing economies and home to the African Union’s headquarters. But amid high concerns about the bloody war there, Ethiopia will still be a major topic, with Blinken expected to focus a fair amount of his time in Nairobi on the issue after warning on Friday the country could “implode.”
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Sunday, pushing again for a ceasefire after a year of fighting that has pitted Abiy’s federal government against the forces in the Tigray region who once dominated national politics. As Abiy’s troops, backed by the neighboring country Eritrea and the neighboring region Amhara, continue to blockade Tigray, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front has been joined by other ethnic-based groups in a march toward the capital, Addis Ababa, possibly to overthrow Abiy’s government.
“Certainly the Ethiopia matter is an important one and takes up a tremendous amount of time and attention by our leadership,” Ervin Massinga, a top U.S. diplomat for Africa, told reporters before the trip.
But while some have called for greater U.S. leadership, including sanctions against the Ethiopian government and Tigrayan leaders fighting on either side, Massinga said the U.S. is committed “to African partnerships and African solutions to African challenges.”
The African Union’s special envoy, former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, has been the leading mediator, shepherding quiet but intense diplomacy to achieve a ceasefire and start political negotiations. Obasanjo will return to Addis Ababa “in the coming days,” a senior State Department official said Tuesday, and while the administration may again deploy its special envoy for the region, Jeffrey Feltman, they will continue “supporting [Obasanjo’s] process as much as possible and looking for there to be progress,” they added.
The U.S. also remains engaged across the border in Sudan, where military leaders have derailed a historic transition to democracy that was celebrated around the world. The top U.S. diplomat for Africa, Ambassador Molly Phee, arrived in Khartoum Sunday — the highest-level American official to visit since Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and other military leaders detained their civilian counterparts in a transitional government that was meant to steer the country toward democratic elections next July.
So far, U.S. cuts to economic aid, the suspension of loans from the World Bank and others and mass demonstrations across Sudan have not convinced Burhan to reverse course. As time goes on, some analysts warn it will be more difficult to dislodge Burhan’s newly installed picks in a transitional government.
But Blinken will try to pivot attention to what the Biden administration casts as a reinvigorated U.S. relationship with countries across Africa, after four years of the Trump administration largely ignoring or insulting Africans.
In particular, Blinken will focus on addressing the coronavirus pandemic, combatting climate change, investing in infrastructure and boosting democracy and the rule of law, according to Massinga, who added he would “really talk to the entirety of the continent” through speeches and engagements in the three countries.
It’s that first issue in particular that many hope to hear more about from Blinken. Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal have each vaccinated fewer than 6% of their populations, per the University of Oxford’s Our World in Data, as Americans are increasingly being offered booster shots. In fact, wealthy countries are administering nearly six times more booster shots than low-income countries are offering first shots, according to the ONE Campaign, an advocacy group.
“As the days go without enough vaccines, Africa remains exposed to a virus that has had hard-hitting effects on our health systems, threatened our fragile economic growth and stifled the capacity to provide basic services such as sanitation and education,” said Edwin Ikhuoria, ONE’s Africa executive director, adding that without vaccines, Africa faces “a perpetual pandemic, which has set us back and is reversing the developmental gains of the last 25 years on the continent.”
In addition to vaccines, many countries have been looking to the U.S. for infrastructure investment after years of China’s One Belt, One Road projects. Last week, senior White House official Daleep Singh concluded a tour through Ghana and Senegal, after a similar swing through Latin America, beginning conversations about what developments the U.S. and other Western countries could back — part of Biden’s “Build Back Better World” initiative with G-7 countries meant to raise climate, anti-corruption and labor standards in competition with Beijing.
The U.S. is seeking a partnership “based on increasing democracy and cooperation and that builds on people-to-people connections, fosters new economic engagements and reinforces our shared values grounded in renewed commitment to democracy and human rights,” Massinga said.
But there is much work to do on those issues, especially after six coups — in Mali, Guinea and Chad — or attempted coups across the continent this year. In Nigeria, for example, Africa’s most populous country and a “partly free” democracy, according to the think tank Freedom House, Blinken will have to address a president that has banned Twitter and security forces that were just found responsible for killing protesters.
While renewed U.S. interest is welcome in many capitals, it’s also unclear whether the U.S. and its partners will sustain it, especially after hearing similar rhetoric from U.S. lawmakers of both parties and previous administrations.
As perhaps a telling sign of some critics’ doubts, Blinken was scheduled to make this trip in August, but it was canceled as Afghanistan’s collapse and the massive U.S. evacuation operations consumed he and his team’s attention.
(WASHINGTON) — The United States on Monday condemned a Russian anti-satellite test against one of its own satellites that the U.S. said created a field of more than 1,500 pieces of debris that could remain in orbit for decades and pose a threat to other satellites.
Previous Russian tests have been of missiles or “killer satellites” capable of bringing down a satellite, but the new test marks the first time Russia has brought down a satellite with a missile.
The State Department criticized the Russian test as another example of what it said was Russia’s “dangerous and irresponsible behavior” in its space military operations.
“Earlier today the Russian Federation recklessly conducted a destructive test of a direct–ascent anti satellite missile against one of its own satellites,” Ned Price, the State Department spokesman told reporters Monday.
“This test has so far generated over fifteen hundred pieces of trackable orbital debris and hundreds of thousands of pieces of smaller orbital debris that now threatens the interests of all nations,” said Price.
“Russia’s dangerous and irresponsible behavior jeopardizes the long term sustainability of our space and clearly demonstrates that Russia’s claims of opposing the weapons and weaponization of space are disingenuous and hypocritical,” said Price in language not typically seen in diplomatic statements.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the Defense Department shared similar concerns about the new Russian test.
“We watch closely the kinds of capabilities that Russia seems to want to develop which could pose a threat not just to our national security interests, but the security instance of other spacefaring nations,” said Kirby.
The new test marked the first time Russia destroyed an orbiting satellite with a ground-based missile, but previous tests have also sparked strong U.S. criticism. Last year, Russia carried out two similar tests with ground-based missiles that either demonstrated the capability or missed their targets. A third test in July of last year involved a different anti-satellite technology when a “killer satellite” deployed a projectile in the direction of another satellite.
In 2007, China drew international condemnation after it destroyed an orbiting satellite that created a large debris field. The following year the United States brought down an American satellite for which the remaining fuel supply posed a threat to human populations upon reentry but also showed that the U.S. could target an orbiting satellite.
In 2019, India destroyed one of its satellites demonstrating that it, too, was capable of anti-satellite technology.
“Russia has demonstrated a complete disregard for the security, safety, stability, and long-term sustainability of the space domain for all nations,” Gen. James Dickinson, the commander of U.S. Space Command, said in a statement.
“The debris created by Russia’s DA-ASAT will continue to pose a threat to activities in outer space for years to come, putting satellites and space missions at risk, as well as forcing more collision avoidance maneuvers,” said Dickinson. “Space activities underpin our way of life and this kind of behavior is simply irresponsible.”
Price said the test would “significantly increase the risk to astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station, as well as to other human spaceflight activities.” That threat seems to have been borne out on Monday when the seven American and Russian crewmembers aboard the space station were ordered for a time to take refuge in their Dragon and Soyuz lifeboats as the space station repeatedly passed through an unspecified debris field.
Earlier on Monday, U.S. Space Command confirmed that it was “aware of a debris-generating event in outer space” and that it was “actively working to characterize the debris field and will continue to ensure all space-faring nations have the information necessary to maneuver satellites if impacted.”
(NEW YORK) — Hundreds of migrants moved to a crossing point on the border between Belarus and Poland on Monday, encouraged by Belarusian security forces in what Poland’s government said was another attempt by Belarus’ authorities to exacerbate the migration crisis there.
Over 2,000 migrants, mostly from the Middle East, have been trapped in a makeshift camp at the border since last week, caught up in what European Union countries say is an effort by Belarus’ authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko to orchestrate a humanitarian crisis on its borders.
On Monday, hundreds of migrants packed up their belongings and moved toward the border crossing point itself at the Polish town of Kuznica in another attempt to cross. Polish guards in riot gear again blocked their path and the crowds halted.
Videos released by Poland’s authorities showed hundreds of people sitting on the road at the crossing in front of a razor-wire barrier and Polish police.
“An attempt is being made to force the border through, all under the supervision of Belarusian services,” Poland’s border service wrote on Twitter.
Belarus’ Lukashenko is accused of luring thousands of migrants to Belarus over recent months and funneling them to the border with Poland and neighboring Lithuania, in a form of retaliation against those countries for supporting Belarus’ pro-democracy movement that came close to toppling him last year.
Poland and Lithuania have blocked the migrants, and hundreds of people have become trapped in the forests along the border, often for weeks in freezing temperatures and without food.
The campaign blew up into a major European crisis last week after Belarus marched the 2,000 migrants up to the border close to Kuznica. For seven days, the migrants have been living in the open air in a make-shift camp pressed up against the border’s razor-wire fence and blockaded by dozens of Polish police and border troops.
Polish authorities over the weekend had accused Belarus of preparing to stage a fresh attempt to escalate the standoff at the border.
Activists from Polish refugee rights groups that have been providing humanitarian aid to migrants in the woods also accused Belarusian authorities of spreading misinformation to encourage the migrants to try to cross in the hope of inciting clashes.
“For several days now we have witnessed the migrants being subjected to a professionally prepared disinformation action,” Grupa Granica, an umbrella group for the activists said in a statement Sunday. It accused Belarus’ authorities of telling the migrants false information that Germany and Poland were preparing to settle them.
“This suggests attempts at raising the migrants’ hopes for a safe passage to western European countries, to then keep them in the camp at the Polish border, all in order to exert further pressure on the EU,’ the group said.
A Syrian man in the camp on Sunday told ABC News people there believed the EU on Monday would consider a plan for evacuating them, something that is not true.
The man, who asked to be identified as Yousef, said Belarusian guards had stopped handing out food and firewood on Sunday, in what he believed was an attempt to make people desperate.
“They are trying to make people crazy,” he said by phone. Yousef said he and nine Syrians with him had not eaten for four days and that they had been trapped in the forest for nearly a month.
“They treat us like animals,” he said.
Belarus has blamed the crisis on Poland and European countries, accusing them of failing to observe human rights.
EU foreign ministers were meeting on Monday for a planned summit where it was expected they will announce expanded sanctions against Belarusian individuals and entities involved in the migration crisis.
The EU has been seeking to cut off the flow of migrants to Belarus by threatening sanctions against airlines flying them there. Those efforts appear to have borne some fruit in recent days.
Turkish Airlines has announced it will no longer fly Iraqi, Syrian and Yemeni citizens from Istanbul to Belarus’ capital Minsk, and the Syrian carrier Cham Wings Airlines has also said it is halting its flights.
(NEW YORK) — Around 150 former Afghan Air Force pilots and personnel, who were trapped in Tajikistan for months after fleeing Afghanistan, have been airlifted by the United States out of the country to the United Arab Emirates.
The pilots had spent nearly three months in detention in Tajikistan after they used their military aircraft to fly to Afghanistan’s northern neighbor as the Taliban seized Kabul in August. But some of the pilots found themselves in a frightening limbo, detained in a hotel complex by Tajikistan’s authorities, where they said they spent weeks held largely incommunicado and unsure if they might be sent back to the Taliban.
The pilots who spoke with ABC News also said they were poorly fed and were often without electricity in detention. Among them was a female pilot nine months pregnant, they said.
The pilots were taken to the airport in Tajikistan’s capital Dushanbe by staff from the U.S. embassy last Tuesday and put on a charter flight to Dubai, according to the pilots and Department of Defense. There, the evacuees were placed in quarantine in a hotel and are now beginning the process of being assessed for resettlement to the U.S. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday that the pilots were evacuated as part of a group of approximately 191 Afghans.
The evacuation occurred as the U.S. continued to wrestle with the colossal task of resettling tens of thousands of Afghans who served the U.S. and Afghanistan’s toppled American-backed government and who are now at risk of mistreatment or execution by the Taliban.
“It’s just a huge relief,” said David Hicks, a former brigadier general and CEO of Sacred Promise, a nongovernmental organization run by current and ex-U.S. military officers that have been working on getting the pilots out. “The team is tremendously relieved and happy to have those individuals out and moving onto their next step to freedom.”
In August, as the Taliban closed in, around 400 pilots and personnel also used their aircraft to fly to Uzbekistan, where they too were detained. But the U.S. was able to negotiate their release in Uzbekistan more quickly, flying the group out in mid-September, officials said.
But negotiations to arrange the evacuation for those in Tajikistan took longer and the pilots said they had been unsure whether they might be sent back. The Taliban had called on the pilots to return and have promised a general amnesty for former Afghan military personnel. But few of the pilots said they did not trust the guarantees.
“It was a rough time over there,” said Ahadi Ab Wajid, a lieutenant who piloted A-29 light reconnaissance aircraft and was evacuated Tuesday.
Speaking by phone from Dubai, he said in Tajikistan, the pilots had lived in poorly heated accommodation and at times had to drink river water.
Ab Wajid said the pilots were still worried about their families, who many had left in Afghanistan.
“It’s hard for them, because they left the place we used to live in. Now they’re living somewhere else and nobody is there to support and help,” he said. “But still thanks God, thanks God that we are out of there,” he said, referring to Tajikistan.
The pilots in Dubai are now being processed to allow them to be resettled in the U.S.
Family of 5 in hiding from Taliban pleads for help getting out of Afghanistan
“All the guys are happy,” said Haseebullah Ibrahimkhail, a helicopter pilot also on Tuesday’s flight. “You can see it in their faces.”
Ibrahimkhail said he was missing his wife and two young daughters who are in Hungary now, having fled Afghanistan. He said he was also preoccupied with thinking about his comrades still in Afghanistan.
Thousands more former Afghan Air Force and other military personnel are still trapped in Afghanistan, with many still appealing for evacuation by the U.S., according to Hicks. Ibrahimkhail said his former comrades fear execution if found, and are barely venturing outside, meaning they are unable to work and are now struggling to feed their families.
The Taliban are reportedly searching for former military personnel and some pilots have told ABC their relatives had been questioned about their whereabouts.
Hick’s NGO, Sacred Promise, is lobbying the U.S. to prioritize the evacuation of the pilots still in Afghanistan, where he said the danger to them was growing.
“We get stories, pretty much daily, either of beatings or having to move,” said Hicks. “And frankly, it’s not going to go away anytime soon — this is going to continue either until we get them out or until the worst case happens.”
(LONDON) — Queen Elizabeth II canceled a planned public appearance Sunday after spraining her back.
In a statement, Buckingham Palace said the queen “has decided this morning with great regret that she will not be able to attend today’s Remembrance Sunday Service at the Cenotaph.”
It said she was “disappointed that she will miss the service.”
This is the first time the 95-year-old monarch has missed the Cenotaph because of ill health, ABC News royal contributor Victoria Murphy said. She has missed the event, which commemorates the contribution of British and Commonwealth military and civilian servicemen and women in the two World Wars for other reasons, in the past.
The queen’s son, Charles, the prince of Wales, attended the event in her place Sunday, and placed a wreath at the memorial on her behalf. Charles’ wife, Camilla, the duchess of Cornwall, and Prince William and Kate Middleton, the duke and duchess of Cambridge, also attended.
Others who attended included the earl and countess of Wessex, the princess royal and vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, the duke and duchess of Gloucester, the duke of Kent and Princess Alexandra.
Last month, the queen spent one night in the hospital for “preliminary investigations.” She was released on Oct. 21 and was back at her desk at Windsor Castle that afternoon, according to a palace spokesperson.
The queen had also been scheduled to attend an evening reception on Nov. 1 at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP26, in Glasgow, but had been advised by doctors to rest. Murphy said the queen’s sprained back is unrelated to that advice.
Since doctors have advised Queen Elizabeth to rest, the royal household has scaled back her diary, keeping engagements light.
(GLASGOW, Scotland) — Leaders from nearly every country in the world have converged upon Glasgow, Scotland, for COP26, the United Nations Climate Change Conference that experts are touting as the most important environmental summit in history.
The conference, delayed by a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, was designed as the check-in for the progress countries are making after entering the Paris Agreement, which aims to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, a value that would be disastrous to exceed, according to climate scientists. More ambitious efforts aim to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Not one country is going into COP26 on track to meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement, according to experts. They will need to work together to find collective solutions that will drastically cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.
“We need to move from commitments into action,” Jim Harmon, chairman of the World Resources Institute, told ABC News. “The path to a better future is still possible, but time is running out.”
All eyes will be on the biggest emitters: China, the U.S. and India. While China is responsible for about 26% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, more than all other developed countries combined, the cumulative emissions from the U.S. over the past century are likely twice that of China’s, David Sandalow, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, told ABC News.
Latest headlines:
-US, China announce joint statement addressing climate crisis
-America ‘ready to take on the challenge,’ Pelosi says
-Obama addresses COP26, endorses Biden’s ‘Build Back Better’ bill
-American agriculture is ready to tackle climate change, agriculture secretary says
-US needs to ‘get in the game’ on clean energy transitions, energy secretary say
-Biden, world leaders push to conserve global forests
Here’s how the conference is developing. All times Eastern.
Nov 13, 3:15 pm
COP26 adopts Glasgow Climate Pact
COP26 has officially adopted the Glasgow Climate Pact, a 10-page document that lays out the groundwork for how the world will attempt to prevent the worst impacts of climate change.
Nearly 200 countries agreed on the importance of addressing climate change but deep divisions still remained about the future of fossil fuels and rich countries’ reluctance to provide full-fledged financial support to countries more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.
Representatives from several countries said the pact did not go far enough to address the climate crisis but they could not justify leaving Glasgow without any progress on the issue.
-ABC News’ Stephanie Ebbs
Nov 12, 5:10 pm
Final Glasgow deal yet to come as negotiations continue on last day
Despite being the last stipulated date for the COP26, country representatives continue to work on finalizing the draft of the Glasgow deal. The negotiations are expected to continue into the night.
Countries continue to dispute who bears the financial burden of climate action and the deadlines for carbon emissions reductions. Some disagreements also took place over the semantics of the draft as representatives argued over whether “requests” or “urges” was a better fit when talking about climate goals.
The final day also witnessed walkouts and protests from climate activists around the world who claimed their voices were not being heard.
Crowds outside chanted: “Fighting for justice, and for liberation.”
Nov 11, 4:33 pm
Developing, vulnerable countries point fingers at rich countries, COP26 draft letter
Developing countries, including top emitters China and India, are asking for changes to the COP26 draft letter focusing more on reparations from established countries.
On Wednesday, Diego Pacheco Balanza, the head of Bolivia’s delegation and spokesman for the Like-Minded Developing Countries group, along with 21 other countries released an opposition to the draft agreement.
They say it is unfair for rich countries who built their economies on fossil fuels to tell developing countries what to do without recognizing that historical responsibility.
“We will never achieve the targets they are putting forward for the entire world. So we need to fight — the developing world — against this carbon colonialism,” Balanza said at a press conference Friday.
The statement comes amid rising concerns from vulnerable countries in the Global South, which claim that COP26 isn’t focusing enough on their needs.
Uganda’s Vanessa Nakate emphasized that any additional global temperature warming could lead to more suffering in her country.
“A 2.4-degree [warmer] world is a death sentence for communities like mine; 1.2 degrees is already hell for us,” Nakate told reporters Wednesday night.
Similarly, Elizabeth Wathuti from Kenya spoke about climate-related starvation in her country, urging leaders to keep those affected by it at the front of their minds.
“The big question is, are the leaders here going to step up to do what must be done to save those lives and livelihoods that are at stake?” Wathuti asked. “I come from Kenya where over 2 million Kenyans are facing climate-related starvation and I need answers when I go back to my communities to my country. What are we going to tell these people whose lives and livelihoods are at stake when we go back?”
Nov 10, 3:29 pm
US, China announce joint statement addressing climate crisis
Top carbon emitters U.S. and China have committed to working together on reducing emissions and transitioning to renewable energy over the next decade, according to U.S. Special Envoy for Climate John Kerry.
Kerry said it’s important that the countries work together on climate issues.
“And as I’ve said many times, the United States and China have no shortage of differences. But on climate, cooperation is the only way to get things done,” he told reporters Wednesday.
ABC News’ Stephanie Ebbs
Nov 09, 1:39 pm
America ‘ready to take on the challenge,’ Pelosi says
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi focused on the domestic political success of the Build Back Better plan and its investment in climate change while speaking to reporters at COP26, continuing the message that America is back on the international climate stage.
“We come here equipped, ready to take on the challenge to meet the moment,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi said she still plans to pass the reconciliation bill the week of Nov. 15 and backed up remarks made by former President Barack Obama on Monday — that both he and President Biden could take more aggressive action on climate change if it wasn’t for near Republican control on Capitol Hill.
“Let me just say that when President Obama was president and we had majority in the first term … we did pass in the House a very strong climate bill,” she said.
“Sixty votes in the Senate is an obstacle that is very hard to overcome and is another subject for another day.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also declared that “America is back” but was more critical, saying that leaders will need to “actually deliver.”
“We’re here to say that we’re not just back, we’re different … and we are more open, I think, to questioning prior assumptions about what is politically possible and that is what is exciting about this time,” she said.
(GLASGOW, Scotland) — Leaders from nearly every country in the world have converged upon Glasgow, Scotland, for COP26, the United Nations Climate Change Conference that experts are touting as the most important environmental summit in history.
The conference, delayed by a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, was designed as the check-in for the progress countries are making after entering the Paris Agreement, which aims to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, a value that would be disastrous to exceed, according to climate scientists. More ambitious efforts aim to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Not one country is going into COP26 on track to meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement, according to experts. They will need to work together to find collective solutions that will drastically cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.
“We need to move from commitments into action,” Jim Harmon, chairman of the World Resources Institute, told ABC News. “The path to a better future is still possible, but time is running out.”
All eyes will be on the biggest emitters: China, the U.S. and India. While China is responsible for about 26% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, more than all other developed countries combined, the cumulative emissions from the U.S. over the past century are likely twice that of China’s, David Sandalow, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, told ABC News.
Latest headlines:
-US, China announce joint statement addressing climate crisis
-America ‘ready to take on the challenge,’ Pelosi says
-Obama addresses COP26, endorses Biden’s ‘Build Back Better’ bill
-American agriculture is ready to tackle climate change, agriculture secretary says
-US needs to ‘get in the game’ on clean energy transitions, energy secretary say
-Biden, world leaders push to conserve global forests
Here’s how the conference is developing. All times Eastern.
Nov 12, 5:10 pm
Final Glasgow deal yet to come as negotiations continue on last day
Despite being the last stipulated date for the COP26, country representatives continue to work on finalizing the draft of the Glasgow deal. The negotiations are expected to continue into the night.
Countries continue to dispute who bears the financial burden of climate action and the deadlines for carbon emissions reductions. Some disagreements also took place over the semantics of the draft as representatives argued over whether “requests” or “urges” was a better fit when talking about climate goals.
The final day also witnessed walkouts and protests from climate activists around the world who claimed their voices were not being heard.
Crowds outside chanted: “Fighting for justice, and for liberation.”
Nov 11, 4:33 pm
Developing, vulnerable countries point fingers at rich countries, COP26 draft letter
Developing countries, including top emitters China and India, are asking for changes to the COP26 draft letter focusing more on reparations from established countries.
On Wednesday, Diego Pacheco Balanza, the head of Bolivia’s delegation and spokesman for the Like-Minded Developing Countries group, along with 21 other countries released an opposition to the draft agreement.
They say it is unfair for rich countries who built their economies on fossil fuels to tell developing countries what to do without recognizing that historical responsibility.
“We will never achieve the targets they are putting forward for the entire world. So we need to fight — the developing world — against this carbon colonialism,” Balanza said at a press conference Friday.
The statement comes amid rising concerns from vulnerable countries in the Global South, which claim that COP26 isn’t focusing enough on their needs.
Uganda’s Vanessa Nakate emphasized that any additional global temperature warming could lead to more suffering in her country.
“A 2.4-degree [warmer] world is a death sentence for communities like mine; 1.2 degrees is already hell for us,” Nakate told reporters Wednesday night.
Similarly, Elizabeth Wathuti from Kenya spoke about climate-related starvation in her country, urging leaders to keep those affected by it at the front of their minds.
“The big question is, are the leaders here going to step up to do what must be done to save those lives and livelihoods that are at stake?” Wathuti asked. “I come from Kenya where over 2 million Kenyans are facing climate-related starvation and I need answers when I go back to my communities to my country. What are we going to tell these people whose lives and livelihoods are at stake when we go back?”
Nov 10, 3:29 pm
US, China announce joint statement addressing climate crisis
Top carbon emitters U.S. and China have committed to working together on reducing emissions and transitioning to renewable energy over the next decade, according to U.S. Special Envoy for Climate John Kerry.
Kerry said it’s important that the countries work together on climate issues.
“And as I’ve said many times, the United States and China have no shortage of differences. But on climate, cooperation is the only way to get things done,” he told reporters Wednesday.
ABC News’ Stephanie Ebbs
Nov 09, 1:39 pm
America ‘ready to take on the challenge,’ Pelosi says
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi focused on the domestic political success of the Build Back Better plan and its investment in climate change while speaking to reporters at COP26, continuing the message that America is back on the international climate stage.
“We come here equipped, ready to take on the challenge to meet the moment,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi said she still plans to pass the reconciliation bill the week of Nov. 15 and backed up remarks made by former President Barack Obama on Monday — that both he and President Biden could take more aggressive action on climate change if it wasn’t for near Republican control on Capitol Hill.
“Let me just say that when President Obama was president and we had majority in the first term … we did pass in the House a very strong climate bill,” she said.
“Sixty votes in the Senate is an obstacle that is very hard to overcome and is another subject for another day.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also declared that “America is back” but was more critical, saying that leaders will need to “actually deliver.”
“We’re here to say that we’re not just back, we’re different … and we are more open, I think, to questioning prior assumptions about what is politically possible and that is what is exciting about this time,” she said.
(WASHINGTON) — As it again masses troops and equipment on the border with Ukraine, the Russian government is “looking for the opportunity to move further” into Ukrainian territory, the country’s foreign minister warned in an exclusive interview.
“We do not want to scare anyone, but we have to remain vigilant,” Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba told ABC News. “We are extremely worried, but listen — when you live next to Russia for seven years in an armed conflict, you kind of learn to be worried. You get used to it.”
Kuleba just wrapped up a high-profile visit to Washington, meeting Wednesday with President Joe Biden’s top foreign policy aides, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.
The visit was just the latest exchange between Biden’s administration and that of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who was infamously urged by former President Donald Trump to announce an investigation into Biden and his son Hunter.
Kuleba noted the “turbulence” in U.S.-Ukrainian relations during the Trump years, but eagerly looked to turn the page — saying ties were “revived, restored, relaunched, whatever word we use.”
U.S. officials have tried to demonstrate that, too, expressing growing concern about Russia’s military movements in recent weeks. Blinken said the U.S. commitment to Ukraine remains “ironclad” and warned Moscow that “any escalatory or aggressive actions would be of great concern by the United States.”
As many as 100,000 Russian troops have been moved to its western border with Ukraine, Zelenskiy said Thursday. Satellite images published by the firm Maxar Technologies last week showed large ground forces deployed 140 miles from the border with heavy equipment, while the defense firm Janes said the buildup was largely covert, with elite ground units and often taking place at night, according to Bloomberg News.
Russian government officials denied the movements, then dismissed concerns about them and accused the U.S. and NATO of aggression.
Ukrainian officials have swung between raising alarm at Russia’s recent actions and downplaying them as a tactic by Russian leader Vladimir Putin meant to create hysteria.
“Russia’s psychological pressure has not worked on us for a long time. Your panic will definitely not help, but it can help the enemy. It can become part of the information war and bring no less harm to the country than the fighting,” Zelenskiy said Thursday.
Standing alongside Kuleba on Wednesday, Blinken said, “We don’t have clarity into Moscow’s intentions, but we do know its playbook,” recalling Putin’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine’s territory, Crimea, which it still occupies, and incursion into eastern Ukraine. That still-smoldering war between Russian-backed separatists and the Ukrainian government has claimed 14,000 lives and counting.
That playbook can be swiftly executed, Kuleba warned, because a similar military buildup in April ended with troops departing, but the infrastructure and equipment largely remaining in place.
“With this infrastructure in place along our border, it will not take Russia a lot of time to resort to an offensive action if it decides to do so, and our goal and our objective is to make everything, everything possible to prevent Russia from making that decision,” he told ABC News.
Part of that effort is boosting U.S. military assistance to Ukraine, which both Kuleba and Blinken called for after their meetings Wednesday. Blinken declined to offer specifics, but Kuleba called for greater intelligence sharing, air defense systems and more.
The Biden administration has been “very specific and very committed” in responding to Russian aggression, he told ABC News, taking a “proactive stance” and walking the walk.
“What is even more important from my conversations here in Washington, I see that the United States are ready not only to talk, but also to act, to act in order to deter Russia and to strengthen Ukraine’s capacity to defend itself,” he said. “This is even more important.”
Selling Ukrainian lethal weapons was at the heart of Trump’s first impeachment and the infamous call between him and Zelenskiy. As the newly elected Ukrainian leader asked Trump for more Javelin anti-tank missiles, Trump turned the conversation to ask for a “favor” and announce a probe of Biden, his son Hunter and Hunter’s time on the board of the Ukrainian state-owned energy company Burisma.
While there was no announcement about new weapons sales, Kuleba said he was “leaving Washington, D.C., in a good mood because this is exactly what we were working for.”
“The truth is, there has been some turbulence in our bilateral relations under the previous administration. There was some hesitations of how this relationship will proceed further in the early days of this administration. But I think that it will not be an exaggeration to say that the quality and the number of contacts between our presidents, between me and foreign secretary, and at all other levels of our teams has been unprecedented,” he told ABC News.
But that’s not to say there aren’t critical differences now, even on the potential threat from Russia. During their joint press conference Wednesday, Blinken refused to say Russia is using energy as a weapon, while Kuleba clearly said it already is, including by halting coal shipments to Ukraine and withholding greater natural gas imports through Ukraine to Europe amid an energy crisis across the continent.
“What is unfolding in Europe now is a very complicated game with many elements in it,” Kuleba said at the State Department, accusing Russia and its ally Belarus of pressuring Europe using energy, propaganda and disinformation, cyber attacks, military buildups, and the migration crisis between Belarus and its neighbors.
Biden has called for stabilizing U.S. relations with Russia, including by holding his summit with Putin in June — a meeting that could have a sequel soon. Kuleba said he understands the sentiment and sees no “risks” that U.S.-Russian dialogue would be “done at the expense of Ukraine,” but he warned that Putin only responds to strength.
“Our experience of recent seven years demonstrates that Moscow understands and respects the language of strength. You do not have to threaten them, you do not have to act, to use force against them, but they respect you if you are strong with them, if you are tough with them,” he said.
One issue, however, where critics say the U.S. is not standing strong is Nord Stream 2, the nearly completed natural gas pipeline connecting Russia and Germany and circumventing Ukraine, Poland and other U.S. partners. Biden waived congressionally-mandated sanctions on the German company constructing the pipeline and its CEO, saying he did not want to damage ties with a key ally. Instead, the U.S. and Germany issued a joint statement, committing to helping Ukraine diversify its energy resources and responding swiftly if Russia withholds gas to Ukraine.
But joined by Poland, Kyiv expressed anger and dismay at the non-binding agreement. Kuleba papered over that disagreement, saying what was most important is that they were talking — but urged action if needed.
“We have differences in seeing how the negative consequences of this project being implemented can be avoided or prevented,” Kuleba told ABC News. “We definitely want the United States to remain vigilant and ready, ready to take action if the current policy fails.”
(WASHINGTON) — The State Department has arranged a means out of Afghanistan for the last remaining U.S. citizens who are seeking help departing, a senior State Department official told ABC News.
It is an important milestone for the State Department, nearly three months after President Joe Biden ended the U.S. mission in Afghanistan and the unprecedented, chaotic evacuation operation.
But the situation on the ground has shifted rapidly and repeatedly, making this “milestone” a moving target.
Some Americans who requested assistance have not yet departed, and hundreds of others remain in the country who could change their minds and seek a way out, especially because many of those who are staying are doing so only because extended family members who are Afghans have not been able to get out.
“This mission will continue. These numbers are nothing more than a snapshot on any given day. It’s not that we’re closing up shop, but we are marking an important milestone,” the senior State Department official said.
In total, 385 U.S. citizens have departed Afghanistan with U.S. government help, per the State Department, but that number didn’t include a flight that departed Thursday for Doha, Qatar.
There will be more flights in the coming days, according to the senior official, with fewer than 80 U.S. citizens still in the country and seeking help.
The total number in the coming days could be about 450 U.S. citizens who departed with U.S. government help in total — roughly four times as many as Secretary of State Antony Blinken said remained in the immediate aftermath of Biden’s Aug. 31 withdrawal.
The agency has previously defended that difference by saying the situation on the ground was constantly shifting.
“The number fluctuates as people change their minds about leaving, or as some U.S. citizens choose to go back, as many have family members in Afghanistan they do not want to leave behind, and we’ve seen that — so the number is very fluid,” a State Department spokesperson told ABC News Tuesday.
Some lawmakers and advocacy groups have said the number is even higher, with Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., saying last month the administration “has shamelessly and repeatedly lied about the number of Americans trapped behind Taliban lines.”
The senior State Department official dismissed some of that “bad-faith” criticism as “tinged with politics and partisanship” and repeated the administration’s commitment to giving all U.S. citizens who want out of Afghanistan a way out.
Many Americans who were left behind by the massive evacuation operation in August have also expressed anger and outrage about what they describe as abandonment.
“How can you leave a U.S. citizen with the background that I have, that can be hunted at any time? How can you leave them there?” said Prince Wafa, a 30-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen born in Afghanistan. After serving with U.S. forces for four years and securing a special immigrant visa, Wafa has been living in San Diego, but returned to Afghanistan this summer to help his wife get out.
While Wafa was unable to get a seat on an evacuation flight out before troops left, approximately 6,000 American citizens were evacuated, according to the State Department, out of nearly 124,000 people in total.
The administration still hopes to pick up the pace of flights out of Afghanistan in the coming weeks, especially with help from the Qatari government, which has been arranging chartered Qatari Airways flights. On Friday, Blinken will meet his counterpart, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, for a strategic dialogue where the issue will be among many discussed, the senior official said.
For months now, there have been negotiations among the Qatari and Turkish governments, the Taliban’s interim government and private firms about reopening Kabul’s international airport. But hope for a swift reopening seems to have faded, in particular because of damage to the airport during the August evacuations and concerns over airport security.
The senior official declined to say how close the parties may be beyond that they were “not there yet” and the agency was “still working closely with our partners” on that goal.
But so far, the Taliban itself has not been an issue, according to the senior official.
“The Taliban have been uneven in some areas, but when it comes to safe passage and allowing those who wish to leave the country to leave, I think they have by and large adhered to that commitment, and I think the milestone we achieved yesterday is a testament to that,” the senior State Department official said.
In a joint statement Thursday, delegations from the U.S., Russia, China and Pakistan said they “welcomed the Taliban’s continued commitment to allow for the safe passage of all who wish to travel to and from Afghanistan.” The diplomats met with senior Taliban leaders on the sidelines of their summit in Islamabad Thursday, according to their statement.
While hundreds of Americans and other foreigners have gotten out, there’s been intense criticism about the many Afghans left behind and still seeking departure, especially those who worked for the U.S. military or diplomatic missions and whose lives are now at risk.
“The U.S. military and diplomatic presence in Afghanistan may have ended in August, but the U.S. government’s obligation did not,” said Sunil Varghese, policy director of the International Refugee Assistance Project, or IRAP, on an advocacy call on Tuesday. “The Biden administration must provide immediate, realistic pathways to safety for these communities.”
The senior State Department official declined to say how many Afghan partners the administration has helped evacuate. But they said thanks to the work of nongovernmental partners like veterans groups, a couple thousand have been able to fly out on chartered flights, including some on those arranged by the Qatari government where the U.S. has facilitated seats.
“Even if we reach a point where every American who has raised his or her hand and is ready to leave has departed, our efforts to assist others, that will continue,” the senior official added.
