United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged world leaders at COP31 in Antalya, Türkiye, on Wednesday to accelerate the shift away from fossil fuels, warning that climate action was falling behind rising temperatures and emissions.

“The brutal truth is that the climate crisis is outrunning us,” Guterres said, according to Al Jazeera’s reporting. He said emissions reached an all-time high in 2025 and described the last four years as the hottest on record.

Guterres accused fossil fuel interests of delaying action and called for coal, oil and gas to cease being used as energy sources to avert disaster.

“Fossil fuels must go the way of the dinosaurs, but that won’t happen on its own,” he said. “The dinosaurs did not have a lobby, but fossil fuels do.”

The UN chief said climate disasters were damaging lives, livelihoods and economies around the world. He also argued that dependence on fossil fuels was harming economies, not only the climate, and urged countries to move faster toward clean energy.

His appeal came as host country Türkiye promoted a voluntary initiative to accelerate electrification in transport, buildings and industry. The proposal aims to raise electricity’s share of global energy consumption to 35 per cent by 2035.

The European Union has stressed that electrification must be “clean,” Al Jazeera reported, leaving the role of coal, oil and gas in Türkiye’s proposal as a potential point of debate.

Leaders attending the summit include Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is also participating.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is among the leaders not attending. The United States has skipped the talks for a second consecutive year, according to Al Jazeera.

The warning follows a UN report released last month that found the world was on course to exceed the 1.5 C warming limit countries agreed to pursue under the Paris Agreement to prevent the worst effects of climate change.

Sources