COP 29: Azerbaijan Appoints Mukhtar Babayev, Former Employee Of National Oil Company, As President Of The Conference

Mukhtar Babayev, Azerbaijani Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources, at the COP28 Summit in Dubai, December 11, 2023. RAFIQ MAQBOOL / AP

Azerbaijan has appointed its Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources Mukhtar Babayev, who worked for Azerbaijan's state oil company for more than twenty years, as President of the 29th United Nations Climate Change Conference. This will take place in Baku from November 11th to 22nd.

“His Excellency Mukhtar Babayev has been appointed President-elect of the 29th Session of the Conference of the Parties,” Rashad Allahverdiyev, a ministry official, wrote in an email to Agence France-Presse on Friday, January 5. This is the second year that a man with experience in his country's oil sector has chaired a COP on climate.

In 2023, the United Arab Emirates, host of COP28, had elected Sultan Al-Jaber, the CEO of the Emirati public oil company Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, as chairman of the UN conference held in Dubai by invitation for a “transition” away from fossil fuels – this is the first time a COP has made such a call.