The oil crisis triggered by the Middle East war shows the need to reduce dependence on fossil fuel imports and accelerate the clean energy transition, climate officials said Monday at UN talks ahead of this year’s COP31 summit in Turkey.
The Bonn climate conference, which brings together negotiators before the November summit in Antalya, opened as Iran and Israel launched new strikes against each other, rattling a fragile ceasefire and renewing concerns over energy market volatility.
Turkey will host COP31 in the Mediterranean resort city of Antalya, while Australia will lead the negotiations under a compromise reached after the two countries had competed to host the annual UN climate summit.
COP31 President and Turkish Climate Minister Murat Kurum said the world was facing multiple crises at once, including volatile energy markets.
📍Bonn’dayız.
Birleşmiş Milletler İklim Değişikliği Yardımcı Organları 64. Oturumu’nda 50’den fazla ülke temsilcisine seslendik.
Küresel iklim hedeflerine ulaşmanın ancak güçlü uluslararası iş birliği ve ortak hareket etme iradesiyle mümkün olduğunu vurguladık.
COP30’dan… pic.twitter.com/peKPWWim2S
— Murat KURUM (@murat_kurum) June 8, 2026
“These developments highlight the risk of relying on fossil fuel imports and the need to accelerate the clean energy transition,” Kurum said.
UN climate chief Simon Stiell also linked the push for faster climate action to deadly heatwaves, the expected impacts of the warming El Niño weather pattern and the war in the Middle East.
The war “causes immense human suffering and sparks a fossil fuel cost crisis that’s strangling economies everywhere,” Stiell said at the opening of the two-week conference.
“It’s crystal clear: continuing our fossil fuel dependency means continuing to import inflation and economic instability,” he said.
Australian Climate Minister Chris Bowen, who is presiding over the COP31 negotiations, told the conference that the world was experiencing “the worst energy crisis in our history.”
“Crises like this — in a highly contested, uncertain geopolitical environment — will become more frequent, not less. More unpredictable, not less. Worse, not better,” Bowen said.
“Accelerating the energy transition will ease shocks to our energy systems,” he added, calling for “more clean energy, more electrification, less dependence on fossil fuels.”
The remarks put energy security at the center of the run-up to COP31, where Turkey will seek to frame the summit around the risks of fossil fuel dependence as well as the economic and climate pressures facing energy-importing countries.
© Agence France-Presse