Can Australia pay off Turkey to host COP31? The Brits did.

LONDON — Australia’s bid to host next year’s climate conference depends on convincing Turkey to step aside. 

If they need tips, there’s a British playbook — the details of which are previously unreported — that worked before, involving investment wheel-greasing and support for Turkey’s international priorities. 

Riding high on his May 3 election landslide, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants to use the 2026 climate talks to drive clean energy investment and win a decades-old political battle with his right-wing rivals over efforts to cut greenhouse gases.

“Renewable energy is an opportunity we must work together to seize for the future of our economy,” Albanese said in his victory speech, capping an election where the prime minister backed Adelaide as the COP31 host city.

But to host the climate summit, Australia needs Turkey to drop its rival bid.

Australian officials flew to Turkey last year, but failed to secure a deal. Instead, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan reiterated his intention to bring COP to his country.

Some believe it’s only a matter of time before Turkey crumbles. Australia’s bid has backing from the European Union and other Western countries. More support is expected from the Pacific, given Canberra has offered to cohost the summit with an island nation.

Australia “should hold out until the world forces a deal,” said Richie Merzian, the CEO of the Clean Energy Investor Group and a former Australian diplomat. “The biggest impediment to the COP31 Australia-Pacific bid was the Australian election. With that sorted, it should organize accordingly.”

But Turkey has a track record of extracting more than just diplomatic pain in return for acquiescence. Facing a similar impasse with Erdoğan over the COP26 conference, U.K. officials offered a package of incentives to Turkey in order to host the talks in Glasgow in 2021.

The annual U.N. talks rotate through five groups of countries, loosely based on global regions and countries’ development stages. The “Western European and Other States” group is scheduled to host the 2026 summit. Choosing a host requires consensus.

Turkey is the only developing country in this group, which includes Australia and the U.K. And it has a track record of using the U.N. talks’ location for leverage.

In the lead-up to COP26, British officials courted Ankara intensively. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Erdoğan had a “good relationship on this topic in particular,” said Dominick Chilcott, the former British ambassador to Turkey who negotiated the arrangements.

But ultimately, Turkey was transactional in its demands. 

Chilcott said Britain’s incentives package included a promise to host a Turkish investment conference in London, as well as U.K. backing of Turkish candidates for several international and U.N. posts. He declined to say which posts.

The U.K. also promised to speak to other countries about classifying Turkey as a “developing country” under the U.N. climate convention — allowing it to receive climate aid. “Although,” Chilcott said, “we didn’t think there was much chance of it going anywhere.”

In a separate deal struck around the same time, Erdoğan was convinced to finally ratify the Paris Agreement — a global pact to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius and ideally to 1.5C — after Turkey was guaranteed financial support by the U.K., France, Germany and two development banks.

According to Chilcott's Turkish counterpart, Mehmet Emin Birpınar, who was Ankara’s chief climate envoy until 2023, the U.K. also offered to back Turkey as the COP31 host. He criticized the U.K.’s Labour government, which came to power last year, for supporting Australia’s bid.

“Hypocrisy is everywhere,” said Birpınar. “I clearly remember that [the] U.K. promised to support Turkey,” specifically citing talks at the COP24 summit in Poland and at COP26 in Glasgow. “They promised us in all conversations,” he said. 

Other officials offered a different version of events. A spokesperson for the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs said there were “no formal or informal records or memory” of the promise, and declined to comment on Chilcott’s version of events.

Chilcott also said he did not remember an explicit promise. “I'm sure it wasn't on the list of things that we said we would do,” he said. “So I think if it came up at all — and if Mehmet says it came up, it may well have done — then it was probably just said over the table somewhere.”

A current U.K. official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the sensitive diplomatic issue, said the U.K. government agreed to consider a future Turkish bid but did not make a formal offer of support and was clear that it would weigh the merits of all COP bids.

A spokesperson for the U.K.’s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said the country’s backing for Australia “was finely balanced — and it had weighed heavily in the U.K.’s considerations that Australia’s bid was in partnership with the Pacific islands and focused on those most vulnerable to climate impacts.”

The spokesperson added: "We understand that Australia has proposed ways in which Turkey could work closely with them on COP31. This collaboration would reflect positively on both countries to help deliver a successful summit.”

Australia’s Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water did not provide a substantive response. Palau President Surangel Whipps Jr. recently told New Zealand outlet RNZ that he had personally lobbied Erdoğan to relinquish COP31, telling the Turkish president it was “a test of fairness” to allow the Pacific region — which has many of the nations most affected by climate change — to host the conference.

For Turkey, hosting COP31 aligns with its autocratic government’s long-standing ambition for regional dominance and global leadership. 

"We are seeking to be a leading country in our region, especially on the climate issue," Halil Hasar, head of the country’s climate change department, argued in a recent speech. Turkey’s emissions are surging, and the country recently overtook Germany as Europe’s largest producer of coal-fired electricity. 

In a document the Turkish government shared with POLITICO promoting its bid, Ankara argues that its emerging economy status will allow the country to act as a bridge builder between developed and developing nations.

The document also says: “It is very important for us that the ambitious and decisive steps Türkiye has already taken in the fight against climate change are recognized by the international community and increase global ambition and action by setting a model for other developing countries.”

Australia and Turkey, Hasar insisted, are currently engaged in “friendly, amicable negotiations.” 

Karl Mathiesen reported from London. Zia Weise reported from Brussels.