UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke at the start of the COP27 climate conference in Egypt Monday—and he didn't try to sugarcoat his warning about the scale of the challenge the world faces. "Humanity has a choice: cooperate or perish," he told delegates in Sharm el-Sheikh, per Reuters. "Greenhouse gas emissions keep growing. Global temperatures keep rising. And our planet is fast approaching tipping points that will make climate chaos irreversible," he said. "We are on a highway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator." The choice, Guterres said, is either "a Climate Solidarity Pact—or a Collective Suicide Pact.” More:
- The conference. World leaders have gathered for talks as part of the two-week conference, the Guardian reports. President Biden is not among them yet, but he is due to address the conference Friday. A record 110 world leaders are scheduled to address the conference, which has around 44,000 registered attendees. Though the stakes are very high, few observers expect there will be a major breakthrough. "There are big climate summits and little climate summits and this was never expected to be a big one,” says Nigel Purvis, CEO of Climate Advisers. The conference will focus on implementation of past promises to cut emissions.