An undercover investigation reveals how the Azerbaijani petrostate used its position as host of COP29 to facilitate discussion of new fossil fuel deals at the annual UN climate conference The Business Centre on Baku's Central Boulevard is brand spanking new. This gleaming 13-story tower sits in the neighbourhood formerly known as Black City, birthplace of the global oil industry in the 1840s.
Then named for its famous pollution, the area is now home to artworks and office blocks.
In January, the building was inaugurated by Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev, a man many have described as the country's dictator.
During its first year, the Business Centre has been home to the COP29 Operating Company, an organisation of strategic importance to President Aliyev. The firm is tasked with putting on the UN's annual climate talks, to be hosted in Azerbaijan this month.
The selection raised a few eyebrows. Why would a petrostate like Azerbaijan, where two-thirds of government revenues come from oil and gas, want to host climate talks?
Fossil fuels, perhaps forever
One man who can answer that question is Elnur Soltanov.
He seems relaxed, probably because amid the busiest year of his life, a seemingly endless carousel of speaking engagements and meetings with foreign dignitaries, today's encounter is low stakes.
Soltanov thinks he's meeting with EC Capital, an oil and gas investor.
As the CEO of COP29, responsible for making a success of the summit, Soltanov has been asked to meet with EC Capital by his partnerships team, who are hoping to finalise a lucrative sponsorship agreement.
What Soltanov doesn't know is that he's actually meeting an undercover Global Witness investigator via video link.
After the usual pleasantries, EC Capital introduces itself as "specialising in global investments in the oil and gas industry," as well as being "very interested in investing in the oil and the gas industry in Azerbaijan."
And why wouldn't you want to invest in Azerbaijan?
The war in Ukraine left Europe bereft of Russian gas, and some of the world's richest countries have been flocking to Baku ever since, begging for fossil fuels.
Azerbaijan can lock itself in as Europe's supplier of choice for a decade or more, and Global Witness analysis shows the government plans to increase gas production by one-third over the next 10 years.
In January, officials announced surprise plans to privatise parts of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR). Naturally, firms like EC Capital are interested.
EC Capital's dual role as both an oil and gas player and a climate conference sponsor isn't unusual either. COP29 is explicit that it wants every sector to participate, meaning the oil industry is invited.
As Soltanov says: "If there is something that oil and gas corporations can bring to the table in terms of tackling the climate crisis, they are welcome."
In any case, previous COPs have almost all been awash with representatives of the oil and gas industry. So yes, EC Capital is welcome to attend COP, and especially welcome to sponsor it.
If there is something that oil and gas corporations can bring to the table in terms of tackling the climate crisis, they are welcome - Elnur Soltanov, CEO of COP29
Discussing oil and gas deals is, however, crossing a line. The UN's code of ethics for COP officials forbids the use of their roles "to seek private gain" and expects them to act "without self-interest."
Soltanov clarifies to EC Capital that his current focus is primarily on his role as COP29 CEO rather than as deputy energy minister and that, as far as he's aware, SOCAR isn't planning to sell shares to investors.
However, that "doesn't mean that there are no opportunities with investment, with establishing joint ventures with SOCAR." EC Capital might be particularly interested in "green transitioning projects".
So far, so good. Soltanov seems to be steering EC Capital towards more climate-friendly terrain. But then he mentions the "very large oil ... and gas fields."
Doublethink is a feature throughout the meeting. Soltanov references COP29's climate goals, arguing that "we should be transitioning away from hydrocarbons in a just, orderly and equitable manner" and that "COP is not about oil and gas" - instead "it's about the climate crisis and how we can tackle [it]."
But his other statements contradict those lofty ideals. He repeatedly tells EC Capital that while oil production has been declining, Azerbaijan plans to increase its fossil gas production, emphasising its role as what he calls a "transitional fuel".
In Soltanov's net-zero world, "we will have a certain amount of oil and natural gas being produced, perhaps forever."
One can understand why a prospective investor like EC Capital would be reassured by this bullish outlook.
But it flies in the face of advice from the International Energy Agency, which says that new fossil fuel projects, including gas, are incompatible with the goal of keeping global temperature rises to 1.5°C above pre-industrial averages, agreed by nations in the Paris Agreement in 2015.
COP is not about oil and gas - Elnur Soltanov, CEO of COP29
In an apparent conflict of interest, acknowledging his two hats as COP29 CEO and Azerbaijan's deputy energy minister, Soltanov offers to help facilitate discussions about investment in the country's oil and gas sector.
He promises "to create a contact between yourself and [SOCAR] ... so that they can start discussions."
Similarly, he says that "COP is not about oil and gas ... the purpose is solving the climate crisis" but also suggests that EC Capital "incorporate your activities with SOCAR's activity during COP, so that you can ... talk business to them and also participate in the COP29 process."
He touts "gas fields that are to be developed," Azerbaijan's "pipeline infrastructure" and SOCAR's trading arm that is "trading oil and gas, all over the world, including in Asia." COP is open for business.
After the meeting with Soltanov, EC Capital follows up, asking for the promised introduction to SOCAR to "arrange discussions about investment when we visit Baku in November." A few days later, Soltanov delivers.
Elshad Nassirov, one of SOCAR's most senior executives, writes to EC Capital, asking to meet in Baku.
By dangling the prospect of climate conference sponsorship, EC Capital has been granted access to a senior executive at Azerbaijan's state oil company, with the explicit intention of discussing an oil deal at COP29.
As a bogus entity, EC Capital can't sign oil and gas deals or sponsorship contracts. But figuratively it represents the army of oil and gas lobbyists who have, in recent years, descended on these climate talks.
And just like EC Capital, many of them aren't interested in the policies that emerge. During what's been billed as humanity's "last best hope", they see an opportunity to do business.
Keep your enemies closer
It wasn't always about oil deals. Fossil fuel powers like Azerbaijan have long known that the UN's efforts to limit climate change, known as the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), could become existential if followed to their logical conclusion.
Reducing the demand for fossil fuels, and increasing the supply of clean energy, is anathema to their perceived national interest.
So they got stuck in, right from the very beginning.
A coalition led by Saudi Arabia made sure at COP1 in Berlin in 1995 that petrostates and fossil fuel producers could never be forced into climate action, pushing through a rule requiring unanimity for every decision.
That meant COPs operate on absolute consensus, allowing any one state veto power.
The lobbyists have been there all along, too. In Berlin, their efforts were overt. The Global Climate Coalition, an industry group that lobbied against climate science, sent 25 delegates and disseminated a pseudo-scientific report disputing the link between fossil fuels and extreme weather.
But COP29's willingness to facilitate discussions about oil deals for EC Capital hints at a second driver of fossil fuel interest in the process.
For years now, companies whose profits depend on the extraction of oil, gas and coal have bankrolled the annual talks through increasingly implausible sponsorship deals.
The UK government came under criticism for allowing fossil fuel companies to sponsor COP26 in Glasgow, collecting £33 million from polluting giants including SSE, which runs 11 fossil-fuel power stations in the UK.
The UNFCCC has since tried to limit the influence of polluting industries at the talks. In June 2023, organisers announced that lobbyists would have to identify the company they work for when registering for future summits.
The new rules stemmed from a growing sense that COPs had become corporate talking shops. COP27 in Sharm El Sheikh was sponsored by a host of polluting companies including Hassan Allam, which builds oil refineries.
After Sharm El Sheikh and the UNFCCC rule change, it seemed commercial interest might have peaked. Then the talks came to Dubai.
COP28 in Dubai was a corporate wave that drowned everything in its path. The UAE tripled sponsorship prices, asking for millions of pounds by promising "access and unrivalled networking opportunities with governments and global business leaders."
In total, organisers asked for more than £25 million.
But UAE bust the biggest norm of all when it appointed Sultan Al Jaber, the CEO of their national oil company ADNOC, to chair the talks.
The conflict of interest was laid bare by Al Jaber himself. As COP President, he felt compelled to call for a "43% cut in emissions over the next seven years."
Global Witness analysis showed that his firm, however, is set to increase emissions by 40% by 2030, and will spend more than $100 billion on oil and gas production.
What on Earth are they doing?
The oil industry's game plan at COP has matured since those early, heady COPs when outright climate denial was mainstream enough to tout.
These days, oil companies talk a good game, setting out net-zero plans and releasing green ads touting their renewable investments. They push unproven techno-fixes like carbon capture and storage (CCS), central to their net-zero promises. And they promote accounting tricks like carbon credits, which they use to "offset" their emissions.
Shell has even boasted that its lobbying helped enshrine these tricks in the Paris Agreement, which identified carbon markets as a tool for oil companies to offset rather than reduce their emissions.
This lobbying operation was in full force in Dubai. A record 2,400 industry representatives showed up, and they were hard at work.
For the first time, evidence suggested that the hosts were using their position at the apex of global climate diplomacy to strike new oil and gas deals.
Leaked talking points, obtained by the Centre for Climate Reporting, revealed that Sultan Al Jaber planned to use meetings to push deals for ADNOC.
Al Jaber vehemently denied the allegations, saying he had never seen nor used the talking points.
Months later, a Global Witness investigation revealed that ADNOC had sought more than $100 billion in oil deals in 2023, a five-fold increase on the previous year and significantly more than the previous four years combined.
A precedent had been set, one that Azerbaijan was keen to follow.
The petrostate playbook
The role of the "partnerships" team for COP29 is a delicate one, seeking commercial funding for diplomatic talks which aim to save the planet from the ravages of capitalism.
Before the Elnur Soltanov meeting, a representative from the partnerships team met with EC Capital right at the beginning of the undercover team's journey to the heart of COP29.
The firm is introduced as an oil and gas specialist which wants to invest in SOCAR and sponsor COP.
The problem is, COP sponsors must be a member of the UNFCCC's Race to Zero program, or to have made a Race to Zero pledge.
But if that sounds too stringent, there is another way. Companies can sign a "National Pledge" and promise to come up with a "credible net-zero transition plan" at some point over the next two years.
That's vague enough for EC Capital. And in any case, neither net-zero, the energy transition, nor climate change come up on EC Capital's first call with COP29.
The COP29 official notes that SOCAR is also sponsoring COP, so it "could be a great opportunity to kick off your partnership."
They pitch a $600,000 package, which gets EC Capital five COP badges, as well as the chance to host an event with SOCAR. They say COP29 will "definitely help to arrange a meeting with SOCAR" as part of the package.
It's hard to fault them - their job is to sell sponsorship packages. But the idea that there are any guardrails protecting the sanctity of the talks from unscrupulous sponsors is blown out of the water by EC Capital's negotiations with the COP29 team.
EC Capital proposes paying $600,000 in return for three things - the meeting with Elnur Soltanov about investment in SOCAR, meetings with SOCAR officials in Baku, and an event about "sustainable oil and gas investing" with SOCAR during COP29.
The COP29 team agrees to these conditions. They have, in writing, promised to facilitate discussions about an oil deal at a UN climate summit, in return for cash.
Azerbaijan's National Pledge is a program for local companies, thus it will be removed from the final contract - COP29 spokesperson
This quid pro quo, the use of the conference as a venue to facilitate oil and gas deals, is part of the emerging petrostate playbook which sees COP as just another global business conference, an opportunity to drum up investment in your oil and gas sector.
Now, contracts are being drawn up. There's still been no mention of any climate requirements, pledges or net-zero plans.
The agreement, when it arrives, requires the sponsor to commit to "actively support" Azerbaijan's National Pledge and occasionally provide "sustainability reports", but details are scant.
EC Capital wasn't willing to do any of that and pushed back on both points. Thankfully, COP29 say that "Azerbaijan's National Pledge is a program for local companies, thus it will be removed from the final contract" and that they would happily consider "corrections" from EC Capital on sustainability reports.
COP29 was poised to declare EC Capital as an official sponsor to the world. A junior official asked if "EC Capital Holdings - Investment Partner" would be the correct nomenclature for a "press release announcement."
Eventually, following the completion of a tick-box due diligence form which sought no commitment on climate issues, the COP29 team agreed to remove any mention of sustainability reports from the draft contract.
After some back and forth, with any pretence of sustainability losing further ground, the COP29 team agreed to include a new clause, requested by EC Capital, specifying that COP29 would organise "meeting opportunities with key local stakeholders from the energy sector at COP29."
As the negotiations dragged on, the COP29 team started to express concern that the contract had not yet been signed. A junior official makes the trade-off clear. The introduction to SOCAR will be made only once the contract is signed.
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It's at this point, just a few short weeks after dangling the prospect of sponsorship in return for access, that Soltanov puts EC Capital in touch with Elshad Nassirov, Vice President at SOCAR.
COP29 is indeed wide open for business.
So what?
Some might ask, who cares? If the oil industry doesn't do deals at COP, they'll do them somewhere else.
Sure, access at COP might make it easier, but in the grand scheme of things, there will be just as many oil deals, whether they happen at COP or not.
If that's the case, how can leaders expect anyone to care, to make changes in their own lives in this upside-down world where the process meant to get us off fossil fuels is being abused by powerful people for profit?
Many have seen the debasement of COP in recent years and decided to boycott it. They argue that participating in such a flawed process risks legitimising the bad faith actors involved.
That's an understandable reaction. The climate movement shouldn't vacate the space for the oil industry, but it's a response the UNFCCC will continue to fuel, if it fails to clean up the process.
There are no easy answers for the UN. It cannot banish the oil industry from the talks alone. Governments decide which countries host COP, and who represents them as delegates.
But clearly, as this investigation reveals, whatever guardrails the UNFCCC put up have been bypassed by lobbyists and fossil fuel powers.
Global Witness made multiple approaches for comment to the COP29 team, SOCAR and UNFCCC in relation to today's findings.
Neither the COP29 team or SOCAR - both directly linked to the Azerbaijan state - made any attempt to communicate with Global Witness.
Azerbaijan media did, however, publish a story based on "reliable sources" several days ahead of this investigation which corroborated the sequence of events but said that facilitating discussions about fossil fuel investments at COP29 is not a conflict of interest.
The UNFCCC declined to send Global Witness any comment on the points raised in this investigation.
However, in an email the UNFCCC did say that this investigation does not refer to activities covered by the Code of Conduct for UNFCCC Events - a distinct set of guidance to the Code of Ethics for COP officials which Global Witness had cited.
Separately, in response to a BBC report on this investigation, the UNFCCC told the BBC that "the [UNFCCC] secretariat has the same rigorous standards every year, reflecting the importance of impartiality on the part of all presiding officers.
"Given the spiralling human and economic costs of the global climate crisis in every country, we are very focused on COP29 delivering ambitious and concrete outcomes."
The UNFCCC has some basic questions to answer. Who is served by the creeping commercialisation of the talks? In the face of this new evidence that sponsorship deals are a gateway for commercial interests, what benefits do they bring?
Scrapping corporate sponsorship is within the UNFCCC's power and should be a no brainer, an absolute bare minimum to start to claw back some integrity.
It is said that climate diplomats, the civil servants tasked with negotiating the outcomes at COP, want a stripped-back summit, something less gaudy and more focused on the job at hand.
That seems sensible. The world has tried 29 talks with an ever-growing crowd of polluters and snake oil salesmen present. Next it should try one without.
Notes:
- The meeting with Elnur Soltanov took place on September 13, 2024
- The meeting with the COP29 partnerships team took place on September 3, 2024
