Where is COP venue Sharm el-Sheikh, and how are climate conference hosts decided?

The COP meets every year, unless the parties decide otherwise. The first COP meeting was held in Berlin, Germany in March 1995. COP27 marks 30 years since the adoption of the UNFCCC.

The venue: Sharm el-Sheikh

Sharm el-Sheikh, often called just Sharm, is a resort town in Egypt, situated at the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula where the Gulf of Aqaba joins the Red Sea. It is a major tourist centre in Egypt, and also, like Cancun in Mexico, a preferred venue for international conferences.

In July 2009, then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met with his Pakistani counterpart Yousaf Raza Gilani in Sharm el-Sheikh on the sidelines of the NAM Summit, after which a joint statement was issued that created a political storm in India.

The statement said “Both leaders agreed that the two countries will share real time credible and actionable information on any future terrorist threats… Prime Minister Gilani mentioned that Pakistan has some information on threats in Balochistan and other areas.”

The BJP, which was then in the opposition, attacked Singh ferociously, arguing that the reference to Balochistan had emboldened Pakistan to accuse India of involvement in fomenting insurgency in that restive region.

Selection of COP host

The venue for the COP meeting rotates among the five UN-identified regions: Africa, Asia-Pacific, Eastern Europe, Latin America and Caribbean, and Western Europe and Others. The countries in the region propose a candidate, and a host is usually decided at least two years in advance. If no country agrees to be the host, Bonn, where the UNFCCC secretariat is headquartered, steps in as host.

The rotation cycle has not been followed very strictly. The first and second COPs were held in western Europe (Berlin and Geneva), and so were the fifth and sixth (Bonn and the Hague). After the 2012 COP in Doha, the event has not yet returned to Asia.

Countries are sometimes not enthusiastic to host the event. This is mainly due to two reasons.

One, the host city incurs huge expenditure on the event, not all of which is reimbursed. There are many thousands of participants, a large number of high-profile visits by international dignitaries, and frequent disruptions by protesters who come from all over the world — all of which stretch the city’s resources and are sometimes more trouble than they are worth.

Two, the host country, which presides over the conference, is expected to demonstrate leadership in taking steps to combat climate change. This is the reason why countries like the US, China, or Russia, or even Japan, Australia, or Canada, are not keen to host COP. Japan hosted the 1997 event that produced the Kyoto Protocol, but it was also the first country to walk out of it in 2011. Australia, which too withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol, has never hosted the conference.

India, the third largest emitter, hosted the 2002 COP in New Delhi, much before climate change became a big thing.