UN tells world leaders ‘you must do more’ about global warming

Six weeks ahead of massive negotiations on that very topic are scheduled in Scotland, the current UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, has teamed up with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to hold a special closed-door session with 35-40 world leaders in order to ramp up dialog and move things forward.

Guterres said in an exclusive interview with the Associated Press, "I'm not desperate, but I'm tremendously worried. We are on the verge of the abyss and we cannot afford a step in the wrong direction."

"We all agree that 'something must be done' Yet I confess, I'm increasingly frustrated that ‘something’ to which many of you have committed is nowhere near enough. It is the biggest economies in the world that are causing the problem, while the smallest suffer the worst consequences," concurred Johnson.

US President Joe Biden also hosted his own private forum on the issue on Friday, to which Guterres and other key players were invited to speak. "We are rapidly running out of time," Guterres told attendees at the forum.

There is some concern on the part of officials that, while climate change is growing in importance as an issue among the public, officials may have their own interfering agendas that could impede progress in this area.

"The Glasgow meeting is not shaping up to be as well politically prepared as the Paris conference was in 2015," commented Nigel Purvis, a former State Department official and the CEO of Climate Advisers, a US-based firm.