High fossil fuel prices spread inflation 'like a cancer', UN climate negotiator tells Cop31

A global fossil fuel price crisis is 'spreading inflation like a cancer' around the planet, the UN's chief climate negotiator, Simon Stiell, told the opening plenary of critical UN climate talks in Turkey.

Stiell joined Cop31 hosts Turkey and Australia, which is leading the negotiations, in promoting renewable energy and a new electrification goal as an optimistic alternative to a planet still tied to oil, coal and gas.

Inside the tight security of the opening plenary on Monday, delegates from almost 200 countries watched a stirring short film with scenes of fire, flood and storms that proclaimed: 'It's time to reconnect with the planet we have grown apart from.'

Turkey said it expected 100,000 visitors, including national delegations, to attend the two-week talks, including at least 95 heads of state. A global leaders summit is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday.

But the talks are under increased pressure to deliver, after growing dissatisfaction with the snail's pace of results.

The talks are opening as a historic El Niño builds in the tropical Pacific and less than two months after a glacier collapse set off catastrophic flooding in Nepal and Tibet, wiping away villages and killing at least 1,459 people, with thousands more still missing.

Climate scientists confirmed this year that global heating would reach at least 1.8C — beyond the 1.5C temperature goal that countries promised to aim for at talks in Paris in 2015.

Last week Johan Rockström, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, told the Guardian that warnings about the impact of climate change are growing stronger.

Stiell's message at the Cop31 opening plenary was clear — the fossil fuel price crisis is not only an energy-sector problem, it is spreading inflation across the world. He presented a faster shift to electrification and renewable energy as the alternative.

Representatives of almost 200 countries are taking part in the two-week talks. The world will now be watching the leaders' summit and the outcome of the negotiations.