“Last year, Azerbaijan, under the leadership of President Ilham Aliyev, hosted one of the most productive COPs ever, and guided the process to success. We worked with determination, bridged divides among Parties, reinforced multilateralism, and achieved consensus on issues that had eluded resolution in previous negotiations,” said Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan, Yalchin Rafiyev as he addressed the high-level plenary session of the COP30 UN Climate Change Conference in Belem, Brazil.

“We successfully concluded mandates addressing all pillars of the Paris Agreement. This included the adoption of the New Collective Quantified Goal – a landmark commitment to mobilize at least 300 billion dollars annually for developing countries by 2035, and the largest ever UN-negotiated financial package. We also agreed to set a goal of scaling up climate finance to 1.3 trillion dollars per year by 2035, and the COP29 and COP30 Presidencies recently release the Baku-to-Belém Roadmap, to guide us on how to achieve this target,” Rafiyev added.

Yalchin Rafiyev then noted; “Azerbaijan has already submitted its NDC 3.0, reflecting our commitment to the Paris Agreement. Our new target is to cut emissions by 40 percent by 2035. This advances our previous 2050 goal by fifteen years, marking a significant increase in ambition.”

“Azerbaijan, like many other countries, is facing serious pressures from climate change. Alongside these challenges, we are also confronted with an unprecedented threat of the rapid decline in the water level of the Caspian Sea, the world’s largest inland body of water.”

“We must address this mounting problem with a clear focus on preventing yet another environmental catastrophe in our region,” Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan added.

He concluded by saying: “Azerbaijan is committed to multilateralism and we want to preserve the process.”