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For the second year in a row, a minister with vast experience of the oil industry will be in charge of global climate negotiations.
Azerbaijan’s Mukhtar Babayev has been named as the president-designate of the COP29 talks in Baku next November.
Mr Babayev spent decades working at the national oil company before becoming environment minister in 2018.
He takes over from Sultan al-Jaber who presided over COP28 in Dubai last year.
Little is known about Mr Babayev, who is currently serving as minister for ecology and natural resources in the Azerbaijan government.
He spent spent 26 years at Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil and gas company Socar, in a variety of roles.
His predecessor in the role, Sultan al-Jaber from the United Arab Emirates was also an experienced oil executive who decided to stay on as head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company while also running COP28.
But despite questions over his position and the influence of oil producers on the talks, Mr Jaber succeeded in gaining agreement on “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems” from all countries at the meeting.
Mr Babayev has a much lower profile among climate diplomats – he is not a well-known figure and little is known about what the priorities of the Azerbaijan government will be for their presidency.
However, experienced negotiators say that COP29
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