Azerbaijan names a former oil exec to lead climate talks. Activists have concerns

By SIBI ARASU
Associated Press

Azerbaijan’s ecology minister has been named to lead the United Nations’ annual climate talks later this year. That’s prompting concern from some climate activists over his former ties to the state oil company in a major oil-producing nation. Mukhtar Babayev worked at the country’s state oil company for over two decades before taking up his government post in 2018. Similar concerns dogged Sultan al-Jaber, the head of the United Arab Emirates’ national oil company, as he presided over the talks in Dubai that just ended in December. Those ended with an agreement that for the first time mentioned fossil fuels as the cause of climate change and acknowledged the need to transition away from them, but without concrete requirements to do so.