Fragile Progress: How COP31 Can Advance Climate Security

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“Climate security is the new national security”, stated Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last September in New York, as his country was preparing to preside over the 31st Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP31) from 9 to 20 November 2026, alongside host Türkiye.

The statement signals a recognition of the importance of addressing issues at the intersection of climate and security, a connection that recent UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) presidencies have worked to highlight. So far, however, the COP31 joint presidency has not yet matched its rhetoric with action.

The UNFCCC has historically not engaged with the climate security agenda. This began to change in 2022, when the COP27 presidency under Egypt launched the Climate Responses for Sustaining Peace initiative. The COP28 and COP29 presidencies continued to build on this momentum, dedicating full thematic days to Relief, Recovery and Peace and producing landmark documents including the Declaration on Climate, Relief, Recovery and Peace and the Baku Call on Climate Action for Peace, Relief, and Recovery.

COP30, under Brazil’s presidency, did not carry this momentum forward.  Efforts developed through the three successive presidencies’ work were not continued, and despite efforts by government and civil society, the climate security agenda was sidelined.

The price of keeping climate and security apart

The cost of not integrating in action is not abstract. Climate projects designed without considering local tensions can contribute to inflaming them. When a climate adaptation project benefits some communities and not others, tensions between groups can be created or exacerbated. A conservation project, a dam or carbon scheme that does not consider the livelihoods of traditional populations can contribute to increased vulnerability. Wars, on the other hand, accelerate the climate crisis by destroying fauna, poisoning land and releasing greenhouse gases from military machinery. Conflict can also compromise early-warning systems and disrupt data collection needed for fast response to climate shocks such as droughts and floods. This impact is not marginal; 19 of the 25 most climate-vulnerable countries are also affected by conflict. Still, the more fragile a country is, the less climate finance for both adaptation and resilience it has historically received, as donors tend to be risk averse. Multilateral bodies like COP are where this imbalance can be corrected.

What COP31 hosts can do

COP30’s inaction was more than a missed opportunity on an agenda that demands urgency. It showed that without the host country’s buy-in, the gains of one presidency are not guaranteed to outlive it.

Australia and Türkiye can refuse that fate. Reviving the Relief, Recovery and Peace agenda would not require reinvention, only resolve. Hosts can encourage countries to build conflict sensitivity into their National Adaptation Plans, making fragility a core part of the planning process.  Integrating peace into one of the already announced thematic days would encourage important exchanges on the topic. Hosts can also champion climate finance to be scaled up with lower barriers for fragile and conflict-affected states. Existing commitments, such as COP28’s Declaration on Climate, Relief, Recovery and Peace, deserve encouragement of new signatories. And militaries, among the world’s largest and least scrutinised emitters, should finally be made to report on their emissions and commit to cutting them.

Beyond the COP days, there is more Albanese’s Australia can do. It can join multilateral initiatives such as the Group of Friends on Climate, Peace and Security, push for CPS advisers in fragile states, and keep its promise of making climate security one of its priorities if it wins a seat on the UN Security Council. Australia can also support Pacific nations in their climate security implementation on the ground, and deepen ties with middle powers in Europe, Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia. Domestically, the country can turn a fuel crisis into opportunity, investing in domestic electrification and diversifying clean-energy supply chains, reducing its own exposure to volatile oil markets.

The gains made at COP27, COP28 and COP29 were real. COP30 proved they were also fragile, relying on presidential efforts. At COP31, Australia and Türkiye have a chance to carry the agenda forward and to turn rhetoric into action.

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