Alastair Thompson Profile picture
Aug 8, 2022 21 tweets 9 min read Read on X
The UNSC session on the recent three day Gaza war has now started. Egypt, Jordan and a representative of Palestine are attending as observers. UN Envoy Tor Wennesland @twennesland is now briefing.
Israel is representing itself in the meeting. Earlier the Israel's UN Ambassador @IsraelinUN held a standup meeting addressing media. He did not take questions. He said he would take media questions after today's session.
The Permanent Representative for the State of Palestine is opening the session with a searing address. He thanked several countries at the outset for supporting an appeal to allow Palesinte to brief - they included UNSC members China ,Ireland and the UAE (1 more I missed).
Here is the statement issued last night by the UNSG @AntonioGuterres >> un.org/sg/en/content/…
Israel's UN Ambassador (@IsraelinUN ) Gilad Erdan began his statement by saying that the UNSC would be left with an indelible "stain" if it did not hold Palestine responsible for the recent events.
#GazaUnderAttack
Egypt and the UAE followed. Then P5 member France which delivered a short anodyne contribution.

This may set the tone for US and UK contributions. Norway is talking now making sense. Also short. Now Ireland which along with UAE called for the emergency meeting.
The Ambassador says 80% of children in Gaxa 800,000 of 1 million are in need of psychosocial assistance to deal with the constant attacks on their home.
. @USAmbUN @LindaT_G’s statement is surprisingly moderate in tone - but unsurprisingly repeats Israeli talking points condemning Palestinian Islamic Jihad, PIJ missiles killing Gazan children and accusing Gaza of delaying implementation of the ceasefire.
Mexico’s Ambassador calls for an investigation and the lifting of the blockade on Gaza. He also condemns military actions on both sides, accusing Israel of breaking rules of proportionality and distinction in their bombing, as well as PIJ for its rocket fire.
Ghana says that the council should reintegrate the tracks for the ME peace process without delay.
Russia thanks regional states and the UN for assistance with a quick ceasefire and also seeks a resumption of peace talks to resolve the conflict within the Quartet.

Rejects un-cooperative approach of US to resuming quartet activity.
Albania as usual makes a useful and articulate intervention, condemning the conflict actors on both sides. “There is no alternative to negotiations.” The, solution, he says, come through hard work, dedication and trust.
India thanks those who brokered the peace and calls for peace negotiations to resume.
Similarly Gabon wants negotiations. The UK thanks the UAE. Reaffirms support for Israel’s rights to defend itself. Calls for an investigation of what happened and reaffirms it’s support for a 2 state solution on 1967 borders.
Kenya says most of the same things.
China as President closes the meeting, he says the situation is heart breaking, he addresses the disproportionality of the attacks, condemns the killing of children and calls for the lifting of the seige of Gaza.
His statement is fairly long, and much more nuanced and activist than any of the other P5. He calls for a comprehensive just and fast conclusion to the conflict.
Jordan speaks on behalf of the Arab Group. He expresses concerns about the situation in the Holy Sites in Jerusalem and supports the call for an investigation into Israel’s attacks. “Peace will never be secured by settlements,” he says & condemns violations of the Aqsa Mosque.
In summary the usual - but for the impassioned statement made by the Palestinian representative at the beginning of the meeting - which is likely to receive the bulk of media coverage as a result.
/ends

@threadreaderapp unroll.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Alastair Thompson

Alastair Thompson Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @althecat

Nov 23
A wise head here in the media center just made a compelling counter argument to the practicality of the G77 and China walking away from the talks here.

And it’s essentially based in the recognition of rising geo-strategic entropy and the phenomena arising out of a lack any coherent global order. /1
The loud activist refrain here is “no deal is better than a bad deal.” But the question is what will the mean. in another conversation a person involved in finance talks just suggested that it’s looking very unlikely that there will be any agreement here simply because there is no strong leadership here. And in particular minimal representation here of strong G7 leadership. /2
By strong here I mean “financially strong.”

So the most likely outcome here now looks to almost certainly be no agreement on an NCQG and as a result it’s feeling rather gloomy now. /3
Read 14 tweets
Nov 23
It’s a gray day here at #COP29Azerbaijan as the 29th Meeting of Nations to address what is now a #ClimateCrisis enters extra time, day one. THREAD. Image
Image
Image
Image
Civil Society is preparing for a big day in the COP29 venue till the Closing Plenary is convened most likely fairly late Saturday. Here are letters sent to the largest Developing block of COP Nations G77+ China and several developed world nations last night.

This came after new texts were released on the Core remaining issues in this Climate Summit:

Finance - specifically the NCQG - the draft text contained the first number placed on the table 250 Billion, which is not even an inflation adjusted upgrade on the 100 Billion a year in finance agreed in Copenhagen in 2009.

See: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhage…Image
Image
Image
Image
The open letters to the developed and developing world from #COP29 Civil Society have been endorsed by a huge number of organisations globally.

And will underpin a day of action today at the COP29 Venue. Image
Image
Image
Read 7 tweets
Nov 22
Final official day of #COP29Azerbaijan

The city is remarkably like Wellington weather wise swinging from day to day and occasionally lovely on a good day.

But the NCQG negotiations are still pretty much deadlocked on the most important issue here, Finance, with no numbers on the table yet. And talks still stuck on many of the same issues they were stuck on at the beginning.Image
I had an opportunity to speak the Egyptian Ambassador as I was leaving who is in a “Pair” appointed by the Presidency with the Australian Ambassador takes to try to get an agreement on the NCQG. He was optimistic about a realistic NCQG figure being eventually offered by Developed Nations to Developing Nations. But did not expect this to come until the very end.

And Negotiations will therefore continue today. This video was at the venue last night - Birds seem to have a commute past the venue to where they sleep.
Developed Nations want some nations that have developed since the process begun, Annex 2 Nations, to be part of the contributor base. The two most prominent of these China and Saudi Arabia say they are already contributing voluntarily and apparently not keen to be brought into the official NCQG base - and this remains an obstacle.

The Ambassador did not think their position on this will change.
Read 7 tweets
Nov 19
ROD ORAM In Memoriam. A Photo Thread.

As some followers in NZ may be aware I am currently at #COP29 in Baku Azerbaijan. My fourth COP. And this is a relatively difficult one. Rod Oram died tragically in a cycling accident in March 2024 when I was back in NZ for my first visit since leaving NZ to spread my wings in 2015.

I caught up with him in Glasgow back in 2021 in the time of Covid.

But I have known him for a lot longer as you will see in the photos in this thread. The oldest pictures I have are from him at the Egypt hosted COP in 2022. My second COP.Image
Image
Image
Image
His successor in climate coverage @NewsroomNZ's @marcdaalder is attending his first COP this year which got me thinking about NZ's COP UNCCC coverage trailblazer for in person COP coverage.
There is a great spirit of camaraderie among the large COP media pool. In Glasgow he helped me orient myself, which is not an effortless process as the COP process is so big and varied and seemingly endless. But the attendees and guardians from the UNFCCC are all great people too.

Here at #COP29 at the end of 2024 the brilliant Marc Daalder is now filling Rod's shoes as in person COP correspondent. Whilst there are a fair few other Kiwis here we are the only Kiwi Journos here that I know of.

As I had never met him I was quite surprised when Cindy Baxter turned up to meet him and it turned out he was sitting one row away from me.Image
Read 5 tweets
Nov 18
COP29 Erasure – COP29 Media Center Crippled scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2411…
The official video record of COP29 is being erased every 12 hours & nobody here knows
The Media Center for UNFCCC COP meetings was transformed in 2021 in Glasgow during the UK Presidency of the COP. The new high tech set up has cameras in all official meeting places recording the events in full. The content from this system is then made available to media in the MEDIA Center via the IBC (Interational Broadcast Center) platform.
The center also has desks for several hundred journalists to work during the COP.
The first signs came on Thursday day four (14 November 2024) of COP29 last week during the first week of the COP. Ordinarily reporters attending COPs can request access to get files downloaded through a media desk. This can be useful to extract quotes or report on events that we are unable to attend due to timetable clashes etc.
Read 10 tweets
Nov 12
The wrong headed and frankly selfish approach of NZME and STUFF on the issue of the "Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill" [see: mch.govt.nz/our-work/broad…] is deeply problematic for independent and digital native publishing companies such as @Scoop.

Part 1 of my thoughts on the subject can be found here.

"Google's Support For Democracy And Media In NZ" scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2411…
Other medium sized digital native publications including @NewsroomNZ and @TheSpinoffTV are in a similar position to us - as well as a large group of smaller independent digital and print publications across New Zealand.
.@Google has made it very clear to the Government that it will withdraw its support for NZ media companies should this Bill pass. It considers the proposal to be a link tax and that the precedent that this would create for how the internet works globally is something that it cannot accept. As this is a global policy issue it will not back down on this.
Read 11 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(