The UN climate conference COP26 in Glasgow was actually supposed to wrap up on Friday evening. It took more than 24 hours longer before the closing declaration was approved by 200 nations. For the first time, the world is being called upon to initiate a phase-out of coal. Countries such as China, Nigeria, South Africa, and India had been particularly resistant to the coal phase-out. For UN Secretary-General António Guterres, the threat of a climate crisis has not been averted.

The declaration also calls for the elimination of "inefficient" subsidies for oil, gas, and coal. However, the coal wording was weakened at the last minute under pressure from India. Instead of a complete coal phase-out, the wording was changed to a gradual phase-down. EU Commissioner Frans Timmermans expressed his great disappointment at this, but nonetheless acknowledged the call for a coal phase-out as "historic"...

Read more about it on orf.at!