UNITED NATIONS: Fo­­reign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari is coming to New York next week to attend several events at the UN headquarters as Pakistan hands over the chair of the Group of 77 to Cuba.

On Dec 15-16, Mr Bhutto-Zardari will chair a ministerial meeting of the group on development, which will be Pakistan’s last as G77 chair.

Islamabad assumed the group’s leadership in January 2021. Now, Cuba will chair the G77 and China for 2023.

The G77 at the United Nations is a coalition of 134 developing countries, designed to promote collective economic interests of its members and enhance their joint negotiating capacity in the world body.

FM highlights creation of new climate fund in article for UN-linked publication

The group now has chapters in Geneva, Rome (FAO), Vienna (Unido), Paris (Unes­co), Nairobi (Unep) and the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

In an article he wrote for a UN-linked news site PassBlue, Mr Bhutto-Zardari explained how Pakistan helped create a new loss and damage fund at the UN environment summit in Egypt last month.

“To establish a fund to assist developing countries address loss and damage from the adverse impacts of climate change was a momentous signal of hope for humanity and the planet,” he wrote.

The minister said that as the current chair of G77 and China, he proposed the discussion on a loss and damage financing facility in June in the preparations for COP27.

Mr Bhutto-Zardari highlighted how last summer’s epic floods in Pakistan brutally confirmed the growing magnitude of climate disasters.

He pointed out that Pakistan led developing countries in the subsequent negotiations at COP27 to press for creating the fund. Now developing countries look forward to urgently working in the Transitional Committee of 24 member states to finalise the institutional arrangements, structure, governance, and terms of reference of the fund, he added.

Published in Dawn, December 3rd, 2022