FinancialTimes: "‘Too hot to handle’: climate change pushing Arab region to limits, says WMO." An inaugural UN agencies report shows a stretch of 22 countries is warming at twice the global average. "The Arab region [is] being pushed to its limits by intense heatwaves and severe droughts." For 2024, 3.8 million people were affected, with more than 300 documented deaths, chiefly from heatwaves + floods, in the first such report compiled by the World Meteorlogical Organization, which included the League of Arab States. "The region covering 22 countries—stretching from the Arabian peninsula and the Levant to north Africa and Somalia in the south—experienced an average near-surface temperature rise of 1.08ºC above the 1991-2020 average and 1.94ºC above the 1961-1990 baseline.
WMO secretary-general Celeste Saulo said intense heatwaves, where temperatures have hit 50ºC = 122ºF in some Arab countries, were “pushing society to the limits.” Ironically, the WMO publication arrived only wks after fierce resistance by the Arab group of 22 countries led by Saudi Arabia at the UN COP30, thwarting plans to wean economies off fossil fuels. "Many oil producers in the region still rely heavily on the exports to fund their economies—despite some beginning to roll out solar + wind energy projects in their own countries." Globally, 2024 was the hottest yr on record, going back at least 125,000 yrs, but a cooling though weak La Niña now in place will still leave 2025 one of the top 3 hottest yrs.
Regional drought has been worsening, particularly in western north Africa, after 6 consecutive failed rainy seasons. Concurrently, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain + United Arab Emirates were hit by extreme rainfall and flash floods that caused death and destruction. Who knew that even the weather could be ironical?
