Decks cleared for Azerbaijan to host next year’s COP as Armenia drops candidacy

Another east European country, Bulgaria, was also in the fray, despite Russia having made it clear that it would not support the candidature of any country that was a member of European Union, which Bulgaria is.

In a surprise joint statement issued on Friday, Armenia and Azerbaijan announced “tangible steps towards building confidence between the two countries”, which included a decision on COP29 candidacy as well.

“As a sign of good gesture, the Republic of Armenia supports the bid of the Republic of Azerbaijan to host the 29th Session of the Conference of Parties (COP29) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), by withdrawing its own candidacy. The Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan do hope that the other countries within the Eastern European Group will also support Azerbaijan’s bid to host,” the joint statement said.

Following the joint statement, Bulgaria too was understood to have withdrawn its candidacy, paving the way for Azerbaijan to host the event. Azerbaijan’s candidacy will have to be approved by COP28 which is currently taking place in Dubai.

Each of the five UN regional groupings – Africa, Asia-Pacific, Eastern Europe, Latin America and Carribbean, and Western Europe and Others — take turns to host two-week year-ending COP event every year. The UNFCCC asks interested countries to make a bid two years in advance. The regions decide on their common candidate, and submit it to the UNFCCC. The candidacy has to be endorsed by all the countries.

If the Eastern Europe group had been unable to resolve its differences, and decide on a common candidate, current hosts UAE would have continued its presidency next year as well, even though the event would have to be shifted to Bonn, where UNFCCC is based.

Brazil is expected to host COP30 in 2025 since it is the only country till now to have expressed an interest from the Latin American group whose chance it is to hold the COP that year. Similarly, COP31 is most likely to be held in Australia in 2026. The 2027 hosts is not yet clear, but India has made a bid to host it in 2028.