Amnesty Urges Just Fossil Fuel Phase-Out as Bonn Climate Talks Begin

As global leaders gather for the Bonn Climate Conference (June 16–26, 2025), Amnesty International has issued a powerful new briefing calling for immediate, ambitious action to confront the escalating climate emergency. The organization warns that unless governments commit to a fast, fair, fully funded and just transition away from fossil fuels, the world will face increasingly catastrophic human rights violations driven by worsening climate impacts.

The Bonn conference, a key lead-up to the COP30 negotiations in Brazil, comes at a time when the world has already crossed the symbolic 1.5°C global warming threshold, breaching the goal set in the Paris Climate Agreement. According to Amnesty, 2024 was the hottest year ever recorded, with deadly heatwaves, wildfires, flooding, and food crises accelerating across continents.

Climate Crisis: A Human Rights Catastrophe

Ann Harrison, Amnesty’s Climate Justice Advisor, highlighted the direct link between climate inaction and human suffering:

“The devastating new human rights harms resulting from climate change will escalate dramatically unless global heating is kept in check. More people will be driven into poverty, lose their homes or suffer the effects of drought and food insecurity.”

Amnesty denounced the continued support for fossil fuel industries through government subsidies, noting that state complicity with fossil fuel corporations is perpetuating the climate crisis while threatening the basic rights to life, housing, food, water, and health.

Communities already suffering from conflict and instability—such as those in Gaza, Sudan, and Ukraine—face even greater challenges due to environmental degradation linked to war. These overlapping crises underscore the need for holistic, rights-based climate action that addresses both ecological and geopolitical dimensions.

Amplifying Frontline Voices and Protecting Defenders

Amnesty emphasizes the disproportionate impact of climate change on marginalized and low-emitting communities, such as:

• Indigenous Peoples

• Smallholder and subsistence farmers

• Island nations threatened by rising sea levels

• Communities near fossil fuel infrastructure

For example, Pakistan emits less than 1% of global greenhouse gases, yet continues to face severe climate shocks like devastating floods and deadly heatwaves. A recent Amnesty report documented preventable deaths—especially among vulnerable populations like children and the elderly—during these events.

Despite their crucial role in demanding accountability and defending natural resources, environmental human rights defenders (EHRDs) are under growing threat. Around the world, many face harassment, criminalization, imprisonment, or even murder.

Specific cases cited in the report include:

• Anar Mammadli and Nargiz Absalamova in Azerbaijan, COP29’s host country, imprisoned for environmental and human rights reporting.

• Ongoing violence against Indigenous defenders in Brazil, the upcoming COP30 host.

“The voices, views, knowledge and wisdom of Indigenous Peoples, frontline and fence line communities and human rights defenders must be incorporated into climate policies, plans and action,” said Harrison.

Climate Finance: A Justice and Equity Imperative

Amnesty’s report also draws urgent attention to the glaring inequalities in climate finance. Many low-income nations are paying more in debt service than they receive in climate aid. These countries, often among the most vulnerable to climate change, continue to suffer due to wealthier nations' failure to meet their historic responsibilities.

Amnesty calls for:

• Grants, not loans, for adaptation and mitigation

• Reparations for loss and damage

• Climate finance that is needs-based, timely, and equitably distributed

The organization argues that by taxing fossil fuel giants, windfall profits, and ultra-wealthy individuals, governments could raise over $3 trillion per year—a sum that would significantly support global climate goals.

A Just Transition for All

Amnesty demands a full fossil fuel phase-out across all sectors, achieved through a just transition framework that:

• Centers human rights

• Ensures worker retraining and community resilience

• Avoids reliance on dangerous technologies or carbon offsets that do not deliver real emissions cuts

Importantly, it stresses that climate summits must be inclusive. Amnesty raised concerns about limited access, visa denials, and lack of transparency in COP Host Country Agreements, which are supposed to safeguard freedoms of expression and assembly during international climate meetings.

Looking Ahead to COP30

As Brazil prepares to host COP30, Amnesty urges it to lead with integrity. While the country champions itself as a global climate leader, domestic policies—including weakened environmental protections and expanded fossil fuel development—undermine this message.

“If climate change is to be taken seriously… we need to see concrete progress with clear timelines toward massively scaled-up needs-based climate finance,” said Harrison.

Final Call

The message from Amnesty is clear: a livable planet and human dignity are on the line. With climate-related displacement, hunger, and water shortages rising, governments must act decisively at Bonn and carry momentum into COP30.

The time for incrementalism has passed. Only bold, inclusive, and justice-centered action can avert irreversible climate and human rights devastation.