Azernews.Az

Elnur Enveroglu

Read more

COP29 is being held in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan with an attendance of over 60 thousand guests from the world's countries to tackle many issues, especially the climate crisis which is of main concern.

Let's first look at what the gravity of COP29 is for Azerbaijan and how this country in the South Caucasus approaches some sensitive issues.

Baku has been preparing for the UN Climate Conference since January, a month after the decision was made at COP28 in Dubai to organise the event in Azerbaijan.

COP29 is a platform that creates broad opportunities not only for solving climate problems but also for creating robust and sustainable peace in the region. Azerbaijan also hoped to see Armenia on this platform, and even its staunch supporter, France.

COP29 was supported by many countries that are friends of Azerbaijan, but many parties opposed it, even trying to conduct boycott campaigns. Despite all this, Azerbaijan's being on the right path always opens up broad opportunities for it and gives it high credit for upholding global initiatives.

But I wonder if they regret what they did or don't they see that they are now becoming objects of condemnation?

Former French Environment Minister Brice Lalonde touched upon some very interesting points regarding the COP29 event held in Baku in an interview with France24. The former French minister criticized his government for not attending the event. He even emphasized in the interview that Emmanuel Macron was not honest.

"French President Emmanuel Macron should have discussed with President Aliyev very frankly. We have a long-time friendship with Armenia, but it doesn't mean Armenia was right."

He said this while talking about Garabagh and French-Armenian relations. He said that he was a witness to the processes related to Garabagh when he was a minister about thirty years ago.

"When I was a minister of the French government last century, in the 1990s, I remember, Armenia invaded Garabagh. And of course, many have forgotten that and they think it is Azerbaijan who invaded Garabagh; no, it (Azerbaijan) took Garabagh back and it is within international law and they have their rights," he said.

At the end of his interview, Lalonde appealed to France's young ministers to be cautious when speaking about Azerbaijan. He criticized the French government, as well as the heads of state who shunned participating at COP29, for not supporting Azerbaijan in this matter.

"Lots of French politicians, who do not have memory should be careful with whatever they think of Azerbaijan. I think Azerbaijan is a very nice country and trying to seriously organise COP and we should help them to do their job."