London: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping Friday ahead of the G20 Summit in Italy and COP26 summit in Scotland with a focus on “concrete” climate action, Downing Street said.
The two leaders are said to have discussed a range of issues, including action to address the climate crisis ahead of the United Nations COP26 meet in Glasgow, which is being hosted by the UK from Sunday.
The Chinese President will be absent from the World Leaders’ Summit at the start of COP26, to be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other world leaders.
“The Prime Minister acknowledged China’s new Nationally Determined Contribution and welcomed their work on the COP15 Biodiversity Summit, noting how critical protecting nature is to our overall climate objectives,” a Downing Street spokesperson said, in reference to the phone call between the two leaders.
“He emphasised the importance of all countries stepping up their ambition on climate change at COP26 and taking concrete action to cut emissions and expedite the transition to renewable energy, including phasing out coal,” the spokesperson said.
It came as China submitted its renewed emissions cutting plan to the UN this week, with a promise that its carbon pollution would peak before 2030 and a goal to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.
COP26 officials have said that even though the Chinese President will not be in attendance of the summit next week, a delegation from China will be engaging across the several themed sessions scheduled over the course of the summit, which concludes November 12.
While action to address the climate crisis ahead of COP26 was the central focus of the call between Johnson and Xi, global trade and economic cooperation, and security and human rights were among other topics covered.
They discussed wider international security issues, including the situation in Afghanistan after the Taliban seized power.
The difficult aspects of the UK-China bilateral relations were also raised, including human rights concerns related to attacks on pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong and Muslim minorities in Xinjiang province.
The Downing Street spokesperson added: “The leaders recognised that there were areas of disagreement and difficulty in the bilateral relationship. The Prime Minister raised the United Kingdom’s concerns about the erosion of democracy in Hong Kong and human rights in Xinjiang.
“At the same time, they agreed to cooperate on areas of shared interest, such as developing clean and green technology and supporting the sustainable recovery of the global economy.”
PTI