Reporting from Belém, Brazil
In Spain, intense heat waves and floods have claimed thousands of lives in recent years. In Namibia, higher temperatures have resulted in drought and widespread hunger. And in Haiti, Hurricane Melissa, which was made more violent by global warming, last week killed more than 40 people.
World leaders shared vivid stories about the increasingly severe effects of a warming planet on Friday, the second day of the United Nations climate summit in Belém, Brazil.
“Forests are vanishing, water levels are rising and, in turn, peoples’ livelihoods are being disrupted,” Salah Jama, the deputy prime Minister of Somalia, said. “In a nutshell, we are living on a planet in crisis.”
Politicians, diplomats, scientists and business executives are gathering for the event, known as COP30, during another year of record heat and extreme weather that scientists say is being worsened by human-caused climate change.
This week, the United Nations announced that the world was far off-track from keeping global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, compared with preindustrial levels. That was a goal that virtually every country agreed to 10 years ago as part of the Paris climate agreement.
Instead, with heat-trapping emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation continuing to rise, the world is on track to warm by roughly 2.8 degrees Celsius. Scientists have said that every additional fraction of a degree of warming brings greater risks from heat waves, wildfires, drought, storms and species extinction.
The United States is one of the few countries in the world not attending the summit. President Trump routinely dismisses the threats posed by climate change and is promoting fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas, while penalizing the renewable energy industry.
The environment minister of the small island nation of Tuvalu, Maina Vakafua Talia, referred to Mr. Trump directly. “Tragically, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases has withdrawn from the Paris agreement,” he said. “Mr. President, this is a shameful disregard for the rest of the world.”
Over more than a dozen hours of speeches, other leaders of countries around the globe focused on the very real consequences of rising temperatures.
“All we have to do is look outside our front doors to witness the impacts of climate change,” Kalani Kaneko, foreign minister of the Marshall Islands, said. “The sea rises, the coral dies and the fish stock leaves our shores for cooler waters.”
In Kenya, millions have been affected in recent years by cycles of extreme drought and devastating floods. “As I traveled here, we’re still searching for scores of people who went missing after a landslide affected one part of our country,” Kithure Kindiki, the Kenyan vice president, said at the summit. “Such incidents have become common.”
“Water scarcity has become an existential challenge in Iraq along side waves of drought, desertification and sand and dust storms,” he said. “The crisis threatens biodiversity, agriculture and undermines the livelihoods of local communities.”
And Bernadette Arakwiye, the Rwandan environment minister, spoke of floods in 2023 that killed 130 people and inflicted $200 million in damages in 24 hours. “This was not an isolated tragedy, but another example of how much damage can be done in one single climatic event,” she said.
At a time when international cooperation is flagging and many countries are more focused on issues like trade and energy security, officials are hoping to use the U.N. summit to direct global attention to the dangers of climate change and the benefits of switching to cleaner forms of energy.
“There’s a real focus in these first few days on going back to basics, that climate change is real and it matters,” said Kaysie Brown, the associate director for climate diplomacy and geopolitics at E3G, a European research and advocacy group. “That basic message can’t be taken for granted.”
In between the warnings were calls to overhaul the modern economy
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of Spain said his country was working with other nations to place additional taxes on premium-class air travel and the use of private jets. “This is only fair,” he said. “Everyone needs to pay their due.” He added that he hoped to stop using public funds to finance new fossil fuel projects.
Many leaders also called for rich nations to make more money available to developing countries.
“We must reform the current global financial architecture to make capital more accessible and affordable for climate action in the developing world,” Mr. Kindiki, the Kenyan vice president, said.
The pleas for more money come at a time when aid is tough to come by. The amount of financial assistance that rich nations give to poor ones to adapt to storms, heat waves and other perils of climate change dropped 7 percent in 2023, according to the United Nations Environment Program.
A charitable fund for helping poor countries recover from extreme disasters, announced years ago, has not yet raised $1 billion and is not yet operational. But on Thursday, a new fund for protecting forests that promises financial returns to countries that contribute money raised more than $5 billion.
The debate over financing also comes as the Trump administration has sought to undermine global climate policies.
Mr. Kaneko of the Marshall Islands condemned the Trump administration’s efforts to scuttle a treaty that would have limited emissions from the shipping industry.
“The behavior last month around the International Maritime Organization was shocking,” he said. “It cannot happen again.”
World leaders also used their time to talk about issues beyond climate change. As often happens in international forums, geopolitical rivalries and grievances loom over every discussion, making it more difficult for countries to reach consensus.
Shina Ansari, the Iranian vice president, assailed the attacks on her country this year by the United States and Israel.
“This act not only violates international law and constitutes war crimes, but has also caused extensive and lasting environmental destruction,” she said.
Surangel Whipps Jr., the president of Palau, and Mr. Talia of Tuvalu called on Taiwan to be more fully integrated into the United Nations process.
President Xiomara Castro of Honduras took aim at Israel on Thursday, the first day of the summit. “Genocide against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip cannot go unpunished,” she said.
Edgars Rinkevics, the president of Latvia, spoke out against President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Thursday. “Russia’s aggression against Ukraine seeks to reshape the global order through conflict,” he said. “It takes human lives and inflicts harm on nature for no good reason.”
And Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s president, on Thursday criticized the Trump administration’s military buildup in the Caribbean. “We have the threat of invasion,” he said. “Invading Venezuela, or maybe threats to invade Colombia, invade Cuba.”
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