Community activists speak out against harm caused by Japanese-financed fossil fuel projects.

December 4, Dubai, UAE

Civil society groups including Waterkeepers Bangladesh, Friends of the Earth Japan, APMDD, Youth for Climate Hope, Oil Change International, Port Arthur Community Action Network, Solutions for Climate Australia, and 350.org staged a demonstration during COP28's "Finance Day" at the UAE climate negotiations, demanding Japan cease funding new fossil fuel projects and pivot to renewable energy. Activists wore Pikachu costumes with a #SayonaraFossilFuels slogan.

Japan, despite the critical need to phase out fossil fuels, is driving the expansion of liquefied gas (LNG) and other fossil-based technologies, exacerbating the climate crisis and threatening communities and ecosystems. Opposition, especially from the Global South, is burgeoning against Japan's hindrance of the shift to renewable energy systems. Prime Minister Kishida, during his COP28 speech, advocated for the Asia Zero Emissions Community, urging Asian governments to embrace LNG and other fossil-based technology in their decarbonization plans. Additionally, a summit post-COP aims to embrace Southeast Asian leaders to support Japan's fossil fuel-driven initiatives.

Japan stands as the second-largest provider of international public finance for fossil fuels, spending an average of USD 6.9 billion yearly on new oil, gas, and coal projects from 2020 to 2022. It leads in financing fossil gas and LNG export capacity globally, contributing 50% of funding for such projects from 2012 to 2022 and beyond, despite the IEA's World Energy Outlook 2023 warning against new oil and gas investments for the 1.5-degree Celsius goal of the Paris Agreement.

Mr. Sharif Jamil on behalf of Waterkeepers Bangladesh attended the COP28 and delivered the following speech:

“This is so unfortunate that the largest development partner of Bangladesh since its independence in 1971, Japan, is going to do the most significant harm for this nation by preparing an imported fossil fuels-based energy master plan with false solutions to the climate crisis and unproven technologies while the whole country is an untapped energy mine in terms of renewable potential. The Integrated Energy and Power Master Plan (IEPMP) ignored our science-based arguments and recommendations during the formation process for the IEPMP and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) for the Southeast region of Bangladesh to manipulate critical environmental and social impacts by the plan and projects they are currently developing here. We demand complete revision of the IEPMP and SEA.”

Sharif Jamil

Coordinator, Waterkeepers Bangladesh