COP 31: Turkey will host UN climate summit after coming to a compromise with rival Australia

Turkey will host COP31 after coming to a compromise with rival bidder Australia following more than two years of negotiations over who will hold the climate conference.

Australia’s Climate and Energy Minister Chris Bowen announced on Thursday that as part of the deal, he has been appointed COP31 president and that a Pacific destination will host a “pre-COP” event.

He admitted some people would be “disappointed” with the outcome of the stand-off but insisted people would be “more disappointed” if the conference defaulted to Germany’s city of Bonn.

“Obviously, it would be great if Australia could have it all, but we can’t have all,” he said, at a press conference from the UN climate conference in Brazil.

“It was important to strike an agreement with Turkey, our competitor.

“I believe the model that I’ve talked about; pre-COP in the Pacific, Australia as president of the COP for the purposes of negotiations… and the COP being held in Turkey and therefore avoiding it going to Germany is a model which achieves those objectives.”

Australia had maintained it had the backing from most countries to hold next year’s conference in Adelaide, however, Turkey also argued its bid was well supported.

It comes as Opposition Leader Sussan Ley described COP — which is the world’s main conference to work together to tackle climate change — as a “talkfest”.

“I think Turkey is doing the Australian Government a big favour because we had a $12 billion deficit last year,” Ms Ley said.

“We’re hearing (that there is a) $42 billion deficit this coming year. (And he) wants to spend $2 billion on hosting a talk-fest here and at the same time can’t look Australians in the eye and answer a simple question — which is when will energy prices come down?”

In a press conference on Thursday morning in Melbourne the Liberal leader doubled down — calling it a “largely symbolic gathering”.

She also continued their criticism of the Labor Government for pitching to host the costly event as Australian household energy bills rise.

“We’re facing a $42 billion deficit in the 25-26 year. The fact that this government even considered spending $2 billion of taxpayers money on this exercise just goes to show how their priorities are all wrong,” she said.

“Chris Bowen is very disappointed today I am sure but Australians should be very pleased with the decision that was taken away from this country and made overseas.

“The COP summit is a largely symbolic gathering of, I think, about 200 countries. What I want from every exercise that this government engages with is a real demonstration of how they are going to bring prices down.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told an interview in Perth on Thursday that he was up at 4am talking to Mr Bowen about the COP bid.

Mr Albanese insisted the failed bid was still a “big win” because a settlement reached with Turkey will still see Australia playing a leading role.

The PM declined to say how much the government had spent on the failed hosting bid, only admitting it was a “relatively small amount” which promoted Adelaide to the world.

“We didn’t want the conference to go to Bonn. We consulted our Pacific neighbours. What we did is come up with an outstanding result,” he said.

“Part of that will be a pre-COP meeting to be held in the Pacific at a location to be determined by our Pacific family friends.

“That will enable us to invite world leaders to make sure that the issues confronting this region… will be front and centre, so it’s an outstanding outcome.

“The fact that we have managed to secure a significant role for the Pacific as part of this, that’s enough to offset the loss of Adelaide as host.

“I thank Turkiye as well for the constructive engagement. Two countries putting bids, they both have compromised which is in the interests of climate change action.”

South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas on Thursday labelled the process to bid for COP hosting rights as “quite frankly obscene”.

Mr Malinauskas said it was “disappointing” Adelaide won’t have the chance to host the event, adding the result comes after Australia had to “navigate the quite frankly obscene process that exists internationally”.

“It’s very clear that the rest of the world largely would have preferred COP to be in Adelaide,” he said.

“It’s really disappointing that Turkey’s expression to veto despite the will of the rest of the world.”