UN 'Pact for the Future' Decried for Not Even Including the Words 'Fossil Fuels'

A group of 77 former world leaders, Nobel laureates, and scientists on Tuesday called on United Nations member countries to reintroduce into an upcoming treaty, the Pact for the Future, a strong commitment to transitioning away from fossil fuels.

The Pact for the Future has been under negotiation by U.N. member nations this year and is expected to be signed at a special meeting in September called the Summit of the Future.

The initial draft of the agreement, from January, included language fairly similar to that which nearly 200 U.N. nations agreed to at last year's COP28 climate summit in Dubai, calling on countries to "accelerat[e] the transition away from fossil fuels." The first draft also included a commitment to setting a deadline to end fossil fuel subsidies.

However, subsequent versions have not included any reference to fossil fuels, the burning of which is the main cause of the climate emergency, due to the greenhouse gases emitted. In response, the 77 leading figures have published a letter supported by the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative.

"The omission of fossil fuels from the draft Pact for the Future is another stark failure to confront one of the greatest threats to our planet and humanity."

The signatories include Muhammad Yunus, Nobel Peace Prize winner and chief adviser in Bangladesh's new interim government; Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland; the Dalai Lama; and Stefan Löfven, the former prime minister of Sweden.

The authors of the letter wrote that they are "gravely concerned" about the watering down of the agreement.

"We call on the United Nations to ensure that the Pact for the Future includes robust commitments to manage and finance a fast and fair global transition away from coal, oil, and gas extraction in line with the 1.5ºC limit agreed to by nations in the Paris Agreement," they wrote.

"If the Summit of the Future does not address the threat of fossil fuels, it will not be worthy of its name, risking undermining a once-in-a-century opportunity to restore trust in the power of international cooperation," they added.

Jody Williams, a human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner who signed the letter, said in a statement that "unless fossil fuels are tackled, there is no future to safeguard."

Löfven, who led Sweden from 2014 until 2021 and is now head of the Party of European Socialists, a coalition of center-left parties from around Europe, also spoke forcefully about the need for a stronger international agreement.

"The omission of fossil fuels from the draft Pact for the Future is another stark failure to confront one of the greatest threats to our planet and humanity, " he said. "World leaders should be unequivocal when it comes to acting decisively and collectively to prevent further climate impacts, and instead, they are deciding to bury their heads in the sand."

"Only through unwavering international cooperation to phase out fossil fuels can we safeguard our common future," he added.

The pact is not exclusive to climate issues but covers five areas: sustainable development; peace and security; science and technology; youth and future generations; and transforming global governance, including international financial architecture reform.

The first draft of the pact released in January, despite its mention of fossil fuels, was "somewhat unambitious," according to Tim Hirschel-Burns, a policy liaison at the Boston University Global Development Policy Center. The draft didn't contain many concrete, binding proposals, he wrote on the center's website in April.

Hirschel-Burns called for the treaty to include language that would give more voting power to Global South countries at the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, and an end to the gentleman's agreement that places a European in control of the former institution and an American the latter. Some language regarding Global South representation at those financial institutions was included in the newest draft of the pact.

In May, Human Rights Watch called for a strong pact that prioritized economic justice and the environment. HRW asserted that civil society organizations hadn't been consulted enough and that China, Russia, Cuba, and Iran had sought to weaken the human rights provisions in the agreement. However, the group was also critical of Western countries, saying that "their selective application of human rights undermines the credibility of such an agenda, particularly for countries in the Global South."

"While the United States and other Western countries justifiably condemn Russia’s atrocities in Ukraine, for example, many of them have not shown the same resolve concerning Israel's atrocities in Gaza," the HRW statement said. "While the European Union says it champions human rights protection globally, it opposes efforts at the U.N. to make the international tax system fairer for developing countries."

The Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, which published Tuesday's letter, leads an effort to establish an international agreement in which full transparency is developed over fossil fuel reserves so that countries can successfully negotiate a phaseout of their use. A huge number of government entities and global organizations have endorsed the idea, but only 13 countries have signed on so far.