COP29: We’re saving the planet, one brazen kleptocrat at a time

Pedestrian walk in front of the venue for COP 29 Summit in Baku.

COP29 is under way with few headlines. The 11-day conference began on Monday with little excitement. On Tuesday, British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer threw the conference a lifeline, pledging Britain would reduce its greenhouse emissions by 81 per cent by 2035.

“At this COP, I was pleased to announce that we’re building on our reputation as a climate leader, with the UK’s 2035 NDC (nationally determined contributions) target to reduce all greenhouse gas emissions by at least 81 per cent on 1990 levels,” Starmer told a press conference at the climate gathering in Baku, Azerbaijan.

One might feel for conference delegates, including Climate Change and Environment Minister Chris Bowen, who will miss out on the beachside luxury of COP16 Cancun (2016), or perhaps the studied opulence the French do so well, at COP21 Paris (2019).

Fear not, for the 5000 VIP attendees are comped in the uber luxurious rooms at the Sea Breeze Resort on the Caspian Sea, with access to a 7km-long beach, more than 50 bars and restaurants, and 60 swimming pools.

The US president-elect is not attending. Donald Trump famously walked away from the Paris Agreement in 2017. His successor, now predecessor, Joe Biden signed the US back within weeks of his inauguration.

Sir Keir Starmer

“A lot of (climate change) is a hoax, it’s a hoax. I mean, it’s a money-making industry, OK? It’s a hoax, a lot of it,” Trump said in 2015. The president-elect has been less condemnatory of the science of climate change in recent times but it is difficult to ignore his words when it comes to COP29, hosted by a notoriously corrupt and vicious regime in Azerbaijan.

The COP, or Conference of the Parties, is the “supreme decision-making body” of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. In what appears to be a wholesale dismissal of human rights, good governance or even the whiff of democratic principles, the last three hosting nations have grim track records in each of these categories but have solid claims as money makers.

COP27 was held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt in 2022. Attendees headed to Dubai for COP28 last year. Now it’s Baku, confirming an emerging desire to save the planet one kleptocrat at a time. The terms oligarchy or autocracy are relevant for Azerbaijan but the oil-rich state bordering Iran, Georgia, Armenia and Russia is fundamentally a nepotistic kleptocracy.

The COP gravy train now involves what are known as corporate partnerships. These are recent developments, headlined first in COP26 in Glasgow in 2021. Sustainability partners can come from the energy sector, transport or finance sectors – anyone who has a bit of cash and some reputational blemishes to white or green wash.

In Baku, these dubious relationships have been ratcheted up a notch with COP29 corporate partners run by Azerbaijan’s elites where the beneficiaries are blood relatives of President Ilham Aliyev getting the inside running.

Chris Bowen

COP attendees can wander the stalls at the Green Zone in Baku, and nibble on food provided by COP29’s Sustainable Growth Partner Azersun whose boss, Iranian businessman Abdolbari Gozal and his brother Hassan have won construction contracts in Azerbaijan worth more than $6bn. Hassan was a co-director of three companies in the British Virgin Islands, a well-known tax haven, along with the President’s daughters, Leyla and Arzu Aliyeva.

Moving on, attendees may feel the quality of Azerbaijani clothing provided by COP29’s Textile Partner, Giltex, which has a monopoly in textiles in Azerbaijan. Leyla and Arzu Aliyeva have significant shareholdings in Giltex.

Every little trinket and canape in the Green Zone will have been flown into Baku by COP29’s Global Air Cargo Partner, Silk Way West Airlines. The airline is owned by a former senior bureaucrat in the Aliyev government, Zaur Akhundov. But Silk Way West Airlines is part of a larger conglomerate that, until several years ago, included a bank co-owned by Arzu Aliyeva.

Leg-weary conference attendees may then head to their rooms at the Sea Breeze Resort, which is owned by the President’s former son-in-law, Emin Agalarov.

Speaking of banks, ABB is COP29’s Principal Banking Partner. ABB was formerly known as the Bank of Azerbaijan. In 2016, Bank of Azerbaijan chairman Jahangir Hajiyev was jailed over the theft of more than $3bn. His wife, Zamira Hajiyeva, was known for million-dollar spendathons at Harrods in London. She became the first person to receive an “unexplained wealth order” at the hands of Britain’s National Crime Agency. Ultimately Zamira had to hand over a $30m mansion and an 18-hole golf course.

Jahangir Hajiyev

The corruption was part of a larger scandal that became known as the Azerbaijani Laundromat, where Azerbaijan’s ruling elite laundered and dispensed $4bn through a complex network of shell companies.

Some of the funds were used to bribe European politicians and journalists to write and speak favourably about Azerbaijan. It was a whitewash.

In 2013, Azerbaijan’s presidential elections started well for the incumbent, Aliyev, when he was declared the winner with 73 per cent of the vote two days before a single ballot had been cast. It was an oops-a-daisy moment from the country’s electoral commission but its embarrassment was shortlived, eventually naming Aliyev the winner with 85 per cent of the vote. After calling a snap election earlier this year, Aliyev was re-elected with 92 per cent of the vote. He has been in power since 2003.

Now, in Baku, Aliyev has already turned the beano into a greenwash of his wretched regime. Forget the planet – the only thing that might be saved at COP29 is reputations of some truly awful people. Let the greenwashing begin.