by SCMP reports on warming relations amid planetary warming
India and China are aligning on climate positions at COP30, proving that even bitter rivals can find common ground when facing existential planetary threatsor when coordinating negotiating strategies against developed nations. The South China Morning Post reports that climate ties are thawing between the Asian giants, which sounds hopeful until you remember they’re still pointing missiles at each other over Himalayan border disputes. But sure, let’s focus on the positive: they agree carbon emissions are bad while both continuing to emit lots of carbon.
The alignment comes at COP30, the annual climate conference where nations gather to express concern about warming temperatures while carefully avoiding commitments that might inconvenience their economies. India and China have discovered they’re “going in the same direction” on climate policy, which diplomatically means “we both want developed nations to pay for climate action while we continue industrializing.” It’s a beautiful friendship built on the solid foundation of mutual self-interest disguised as climate justice.
Both nations argue, correctly, that developed countries industrialized first, caused most historical emissions, and should therefore bear primary responsibility for climate action. This is factually true and strategically convenientit positions India and China as victims of others’ pollution rather than major current emitters. The fact that both are now among the world’s largest polluters gets downplayed in favor of the “but the West did it first” argument, which is valid but doesn’t actually reduce current emissions.
The warming diplomatic ties over climate negotiations contrast sharply with everything else about India-China relations, which remain frozen colder than Antarctica’s ice sheets. Border standoffs continue, trade tensions persist, and strategic competition intensifiesbut climate policy alignment? That’s totally fine! It’s like feuding neighbors who hate each other but coordinate on keeping the homeowners association dues low. Shared interests trump personal animosity when money’s involved.
China leads the world in both renewable energy installation and coal power capacity, a contradiction so perfect it should be taught in philosophy classes. India follows a similar path: massive solar expansion alongside continued coal dependence. Both nations want credit for renewables growth without accountability for fossil fuel expansion. It’s having your carbon cake and eating it tooliterally burning it, actually, while claiming to be climate leaders.
The COP30 alignment positions India and China as champions of the developing world, demanding climate finance and technology transfers from wealthy nations. This framing ignores that China is the world’s second-largest economy and India the fifthboth are major powers demanding to be treated as developing nations when it’s convenient. It’s strategic positioning that’s simultaneously legitimate (historical emissions matter) and opportunistic (current emissions also matter).
Developed nations respond with skepticism, noting that India and China’s combined emissions dwarf most other countries. Fair point. Developing nations counter that per capita emissions remain much lower than Western levels. Also fair. The result is endless negotiation circles where everyone’s right about something and wrong about something else, and meanwhile temperatures keep rising because atmospheric CO2 doesn’t care about negotiating positions.
The thawing climate ties benefit both nations at COP30 by presenting a united front that’s harder to pressure than individual countries. When the world’s two most populous nations align, their negotiating power increases substantially. Whether this actually helps address climate change or just shifts financial responsibility is unclearprobably some of both, like most things in international climate negotiations.
Observers note the irony of India and China finding common cause on climate while their relations remain strained on virtually everything else. It suggests climate cooperation is less about saving the planet and more about coordinated negotiating strategy. Not that these are mutually exclusivenations can be self-interested and environmentally concerned simultaneouslybut the priorities seem clear. Climate alignment serves national interests; actual emissions reduction is secondary.
The SCMP article frames this positively as “ties thawing,” which is technically accurate and diplomatically optimistic. India and China coordinating at climate conferences doesn’t mean they’ve resolved fundamental conflicts; it means they’ve identified an area where cooperation benefits both. That’s progress, sort ofnations learning to cooperate where possible while competing elsewhere. Whether it translates to actual climate action or just better negotiating positions remains to be seen, but at least they’re talking. About climate. While everything else burns, literally and figuratively.
SOURCE: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3333729/cop30-india-and-china-align-climate-ties-thaw-going-same-direction
SOURCE: Bohiney.com (https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3333729/cop30-india-and-china-align-climate-ties-thaw-going-same-direction)
