‘Now is the hour’: Labor urged to speed up fossil fuel phase-out to justify Cop30 pledge

Despite Australia signing the Belem declaration, Albanese rejected suggestion Labor shouldn’t develop new gas fields

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The Albanese government is being urged to explain how it will drive a fossil fuel phase-out, after it joined dozens of countries at a UN climate summit to back a declaration that the world should quickly wean off coal, gas and oil.

Australia signed up to the declaration on a just transition away from fossil fuels at a side event at the Cop30 conference in the Brazilian city of Belem, which finished on Saturday night local time, more than 24 hours after the scheduled close.