Masagos attends key climate gathering in Poland

Senior officials from about 40 nations, including Singapore, are holding a three-day meeting in Krakow, Poland, to prepare for a major climate summit in December that aims to agree on the rule book for the 2015 UN Paris Climate Agreement.

The informal talks in Poland have an added sense of urgency after the UN climate panel's special report earlier this month spelled out for the first time the immense challenges and costs, but also the benefits, of keeping global warming within 1.5 deg C, a commitment in the agreement.

The Paris pact is the world's most sweeping climate deal that aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions and slow the pace of global warming, which is already causing sea levels to rise and greater weather extremes such as more intense storms, droughts and damage to coral reefs.

The Krakow meeting, which started yesterday and ends tomorrow, will discuss some of the politically tough issues that need to be ironed out before the Dec 2-14 UN climate talks in Katowice, called the 24th Conference of the Parties (COP-24). The UN hopes a deal will be sealed to set the rules for putting the Paris climate deal into action from 2020.

Singapore's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Mr Masagos Zulkifli, is attending the Informal Ministerial Meeting on Climate Change in Krakow, as he was invited by Mr Michal Kurtyka, Secretary of State in Poland's Ministry of Environment and incoming president of COP-24, to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Mr Masagos is accompanied by officials from the Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources and the National Climate Change Secretariat in the Prime Minister's Office.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on October 23, 2018, with the headline Masagos attends key climate gathering in Poland. Subscribe