India, Nov. 10 -- The 29th Conference of Parties (COP 29) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Baku, Azerbaijan, that begins today will have its most consequential negotiator sitting in the United States (US), influencing its outcomes without being present. On the eve of the inauguration of the second term of Donald Trump's presidency, his declared intention to walk out, once again, from the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change will inevitably alter the negotiating briefs of delegates attending the Baku conference.

The world's largest producer of oil and gas is set to abandon the key decision taken at COP 28 that the world must "transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable...