A regional meeting to discuss the statement on behalf of civil society and youth of Central Asian countries at UNFCCC COP28 was held on October 5, 2023. Before this, from September 15 to September 30 of this year, national consultations proceeded and gathered over 150 people from Central Asian countries.
Each national consultation meeting comprised an overview of the current situation and the formulation of specific recommendations. Most of the consultation meetings were online. However, the Climate Network of Tajikistan organized a workshop, and after that, its participants voiced their proposals online. It is worth noting the high youth activity at several meetings. For example, in Turkmenistan, most of the participants in the consultation were young environmental leaders who voiced the aspirations and hopes of young people and demonstrated their interest and readiness to be involved in climate processes.
Considering all the recommendations received, a draft version of the regional statement was developed and became the subject of an active two-hour discussion. Representatives of the Central Asian countries had the opportunity to speak on all points of the statement, propose new accents and strengthen individual ideas in the regional statement, as well as once again form a common understanding of what this statement is being prepared for and to whom this statement is intended. In this regard, Alexei Kokorin, an international expert of Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia (CAREC), noted that this statement can be used to solve the internal problems of the Central Asian countries, and at the conference itself it can also have an educational goal for the international community about the high vulnerability of the region to climate change.
Yuri Skochilov, the coordinator of the National Climate Network of Tajikistan, expressed the opinion that this statement differs from previous statements: the style has been changed and the text is educational, which was recommended by Alexei Kokorin and this format, according to Yuri Skochilov, is reasonable.
“Work on the statement continues, the draft version will be published in the public domain and distributed to all interested parties for final amendments and bringing it to the optimal level,” said Svetlana Mogilyuk, the Regional Coordinator of the Civil Society Climate Network of Central Asia, in her speech.
Vladimir Grebnev, Regional Climate Change Specialist at CAREC, informed the participants about the planned training session on COP28, which will be held on October 10, 2023. The two-hour training will serve as a good tool to increase the capacity of civil society in Central Asia at the COP28 climate negotiations.
The meeting was organized within the framework of the project “Strengthening coordination and positioning of Central Asia in global climate processes” implemented by CAREC under GIZ support.
Photo by courtesy of Yuri Skochilov