Kerry returns to Italy for the G20 summit in Naples, but not only. All fronts are open

Kerry, the US climate reporter, returned to Italy a few weeks after meeting with the Draghi government. It will be in Naples for the environment of the G20 but also in Rome, where the first Biden-Xi meeting will be held in October.

“Tackling the climate crisis was a key element of the recently concluded G7 meeting,” he wrote. So Twitter A month ago John KerrySpecial Envoy of the President of the United States Joe Biden for the climate. “Now we need the G20 to push this momentum forward,” he added.

It is in this spirit that Kerry prepares to arrive in Italy next week. On the agenda of the G20 environment, climate and energy, whose ministerial meeting will be held in Naples next Friday (23 July) and chaired by Roberto CingolaniMinister of Environmental Transformation. Kerry’s other assignments have yet to be determined, and it is certain that he will also pass through Rome. However, he should not see representatives of Italian institutions, who had already met in May, when the prime minister received Biden’s envoy. Mario Draghi And by ministers Luigi Di Maio (foreign) e Giancarlo Giorgetti (Economic Development), as well as by Cingulani.

On that occasion, Kerry also attended a lunch with Emma Marciglia, b 20 a chairand with CEOs of major energy companies also playing a role in the B20 work teams (Claudio Descalzi by Eni, Marco Alvera by hump, Francesco Staras by Enel e Nicola Monte in Edison).

At his side on the next trip to Italy, as in May, there must be his friend and advisor David Thorne, a former ambassador to Rome during the first administration of Barack Obama. It was Thorne who suggested that Kerry attend the last-minute April meeting in Washington between Di Maio (the prime minister to be received by the Biden administration) and the secretary of state. Anthony Blink.

As confirmed by Daniel Franco, Minister of Economy, at the end of the last G-20 finance meeting in Venice, the Italian presidency put climate at the top of the agenda. He explained that the action can no longer be postponed: to really reach the net-zero emissions target, “immediate and concrete actions are needed.”

And the United States appears determined to engage Russia as well. Kerry has just returned home after three days of meetings in Moscow devoted “exclusively” to the environment, as he explained to him. For example. Journey tells us about the centrality of the former Obama secretary of state to the Biden administration: He was the first cabinet member to go to China (to meet his counterpart Xie Zhenhua In April, a month after the difficult meeting between the United States and China in Alaska); Now he is also the first to go to Russia, where were three of his colleagues in the administration (Minister of Homeland Security) Alejandro MallorcasChief of National Intelligence April Haines and theAttorney General Merrick Garland) due to anti-sanctions for the SolarWinds case.

Biden’s envoy met in Moscow Sergey LavrovRussian Foreign Minister, H Ruslan EdelgirievPresident’s Special Representative Russian President Vladimir Putin to climate issues. In addition, he had a telephone conversation with the number one man in the Kremlin, who was abroad these days. At the end of the meetings, the two envoys issued a joint statement making clear that the US and Russia “will work together and with others to actively promote the successful COP26 conference in Glasgow, UK, and the G-20 that contribute to this success”.

In addition, the two envoys will collaborate on climate-related issues in the Arctic and bilaterally on a range of climate-related issues. A statement from the US State Department said the “topics” would include, among other things, satellite monitoring of greenhouse gas emissions and removals; forestry and agriculture; climate and arctic, including black carbon; reduce emissions of gases other than carbon dioxide, including methane; Promote Nationally Determined Contributions and Long-Term Strategies under the Paris Agreement; Energy Efficiency Climate Finance; Nature-based solutions and the implementation of joint climate projects.

Despite the distances and tensions with some countries, the climate for the United States is a separate issue that needs coordination. Even with China. An approach that Kerry had already announced in January, a few days after the Biden administration took office, stating that Washington and Beijing must address climate change as a “critical” but “in and of itself” political, economic and military issue. and technological.

With this baggage, Kerry is preparing to arrive in Naples and Rome, where, on the occasion of the G-20 meeting in October, the first meeting between President Biden and his Chinese counterpart could take place. Xi Jinping.