World 'will suffer' without fossil fuels – Russia's COP30 negotiator

Russia’s chief negotiator at the UN climate talks in Brazil, Vladimir Uskov, told AFP that the world still needs fossil fuels and criticised Western nations for breaking promises on climate finance.

Russia is the world’s fifth largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China, the United States, India and the European Union.Its delegation at the UN talks in Belem, a city on the edge of the Amazon, has 80 people, according to a UN list of participants.

Here are some excerpts from AFP’s interview with Uskov, which was conducted in English:

There is no official US representation at COP30. Is this an opportunity to see new global leaders emerge in the climate talks?

We are very much convinced that no country should be excluded out of this process. And even if current administrations pursue some definite policies, the problem stays the same. But of course the lack of action with the biggest emitters will somehow delay the results of this process.

Brazil, with which you have a good relationship, is pushing for a fossil fuel roadmap. Is it something you support?

It’s good to talk about phasing down, or even phasing out fossil fuels while you are living in such developed nations as France.”

While people in cities like Belem do not even have access to food and to electricity, we cannot say that we need to develop solar or wind but we don’t have the basics. So, these people need energy and these people sometimes and often need fuels as well.

So we need this good mix of transitional fuels like natural gas, nuclear energy, also fossil fuels. If we start living without fossil fuels, even people in France will suffer, believe me.

But on the roadmap, what is your specific answer?

I cannot, unfortunately, rely on the solar in Siberia, but people live there in Siberia. And of course, people in Amazonia probably sometimes should not rely on fossil fuels, as they have a lot of solar energy. So this is the mix.

Traditional donors, developed nations, are not fulfilling their obligations. They ask countries like Brazil to cut their emissions. And ‘we will provide you with finance and technology.’ That never happened.

Of course, the lack of trust is there. And developing nations, we think, justifiably demand from us developed nations to become bolder and to take good, real actions.

There are four difficult issues being discussed at the moment including finance and trade. Do you trust the Brazilian presidency to find common ground?

Our Brazilian partners and presidency will do their best to bridge the gaps. But, you mentioned trade and financial flows. These things cannot be solved in the COP in the two weeks (that the conference lasts).

You cannot build something illegal, like trade barriers, like the European Union does on one hand, and on the other hand, promise people money.

Brazilian colleagues and the presidency are realistic, they will not achieve like, I don’t know, historic results. But here it will be a historic result already that in the turbulent political circumstances like we have now in 2025, we are here and we are achieving technical steps.

Is Russia willing to commit to a more ambitious Nationally Determined Contribution (roadmaps by countries to reduce emissions) than it currently has?

Our country is subjected to enormous pressure of illegal limitations, which does not help with financial flows, technology transfer and international trade. Which is absolutely out of the UN mandate and which is totally illegal. And despite this fact, we have represented our ambitious NDC.

“I would like to remind you that some bigger actors, I will not name the countries or blocs of countries, have not done so. So we will do much more if we have the possibility to have a fair trade, to have free financial flows and if (the) geopolitical situation allows us to do so, we will, of course, subsequently raise our ambition.