UN chief says 2024 has been 'a masterclass in human destruction'

This year has been "a masterclass in human destruction", the UN secretary-general has said as he reflected on extreme weather and record temperatures around the world.

- Fiona Harvey, Ajit Niranjan and Damian Carrington, Baku

António Guterres painted a stark portrait of the consequences of climate breakdown that had arisen in recent months. "Families running for their lives before the next hurricane strikes; workers and pilgrims collapsing in insufferable heat; floods tearing through communities and tearing down infrastructure; children going to bed hungry as droughts ravage crops," he said. "All these disasters, and more, are being supercharged by human-made climate change."

Guterres was addressing leaders and high-ranking government officials from nearly 200 countries gathered in Baku, Azerbaijan, for the Cop29 UN climate summit. Over a fortnight of talks, nations will try to find ways to raise the vast sums of money needed to tackle the climate crisis.

Developing countries want guarantees of $1tn a year in funds by 2035 to help them cut greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the impacts of extreme weather.

The talks have been overshadowed by the re-election of Donald Trump, an avowed climate denier, in the US. Although leaders including Keir Starmer, Barbados's Mia Mottley and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdoğan addressed the summit, the heads of government of most of the world's biggest economies stayed away.