Photo Credit: Massis Post
On November 1, 2024 the Conference of Parties (COP) will host its 29th session in Baku, Azerbaijan. COP is the decision-making body of the UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). World leaders, UN agencies, NGOs, climate activists, and energy corporations will attend COP29 to work towards a zero-carbon future.
COP29 is titled “In Solidarity for a Green World.” Azerbaijan is an authoritarian petrostate, a major producer of fossil fuels. The goals of COP29 are directly opposed to the goals of the Azerbaijani economic system.
Last year, Azerbaijan carried out a forced deportation and genocide in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) of its Armenian population. Since September 2023, Azerbaijan has refused to allow Armenians to return to their traditional homes. Yet the UN promotes the COP’s decision to meet in Baku.
Azerbaijan is not reducing its production of gas. President Aliyev said that the gas it does not utilize at home will be sold abroad. Azerbaijan has become a key supplier in gas to Europe. Its exports are predicted to grow exponentially along with a substantial increase in extraction.
In fact, Azerbaijani refineries sell Russian oil and gas to the EU, bypassing and benefiting from sanctions on Russia. Azerbaijan’s policy is called “greenwashing” in which it exports fossil fuels while it claims to work against climate change.
In late 2021, Azerbaijani state-supported “environmental activists” blocked the Lachin Corridor, beginning Azerbaijan’s forced deportation of the Armenians of Artsakh. Its siege even barred medicine and food imports. These state sponsored activists have never been arrested, a very different fate from legitimate environmental activists like the jailed Dr. Gubad Ibadoghlu. In Azerbaijan, civil society is repressed and freedoms of speech and expression are nonexistent.
The region of Nakhichevan was historically Armenian, but was granted to Azerbaijan during the Soviet Union. Today, the region is touted as a “Green Energy Zone." 98% of Armenian cultural heritage sites have been destroyed. The same fate awaits occupied Artsakh.
Azerbaijani officials have called criticisms about its human rights record “dirty propaganda.” Hikmet Hajiyev, an Azerbaijani foreign policy chief, claims that discussions about human rights “overburden” the COP29 agenda. Hajiyev’s comment contradicts previous UN statements about the interconnectedness between human rights and the environment. The UN itself recognizes the harms of greenwashing but continues to host COP meetings in authoritarian petrostates.
Environmental activists, including Greta Thunberg, are raising awareness. Free Armenian Hostages and the Armor Coalition are calling for a boycott of the COP conference. Human Rights Watch, Freedom House, Amnesty International, the Center for Truth and Justice, and a group of US lawmakers all advocate using the COP conference to demand the release of Azerbaijan’s political prisoners. In the future, the UNFCCC should set a human rights requirement for the COP hosts. The campaign against climate change requires a free civil society, upholding human rights, and a real commitment to eliminating fossil fuels.