Issue No. 21 | Monday, September 7, 2026
Good morning,
Welcome to The Science Diplomat Playbook, your Monday morning guide to what’s shaping the week ahead in global science diplomacy.
The lead
Governments and experts gather in Kunming, China, on Monday for three days of discussions examining collective progress under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, beginning a new stage in the first global review of the agreement adopted in 2022.
The framework established 23 targets for 2030, covering everything from ecosystem restoration and protected areas to pollution, finance and the sustainable use of biodiversity. But setting global targets was only the beginning. Governments now have to determine collectively how much progress has been made and where efforts remain insufficient.
The Kunming Dialogue is part of that process. Countries agreed at COP16, held at Cali, Colombia, in 2024, that the global review would be led by governments, supported by an informal technical dialogue bringing together national representatives with Indigenous peoples and local communities, scientists, women and youth representatives, businesses, financial institutions and other experts.
Delegates will also confront the lagging progress of the Cali Fund, which was created at COP16 to convert private corporate profits into public conservation projects in developing countries. Its certified financial statement shows that in 2025 it received just $1,000 from a single donor, the U.K.-based startup TierraViva AI.
That makes the meeting an important interface between evidence and diplomacy. Scientific assessments and national reports can show changes in ecosystems, financing or conservation efforts, but governments must decide how that evidence should be interpreted collectively and what it means for the commitments they made.
The dialogue also brings the biodiversity framework back to the city where its political architecture began taking shape. The first part of COP15 was held in Kunming in 2021 before negotiations concluded the following year in Montreal with adoption of the Kunming-Montreal framework.
The meeting follows biodiversity negotiations in Nairobi this summer that examined the first global assessment of progress and warned that current efforts remain insufficient to achieve the framework’s 2030 mission.
Kunming now moves that process forward: from establishing what the evidence says toward determining what countries should collectively make of it.
Elsewhere this week, governments and other participants gather in Baku for a U.N. Climate Week intended to build momentum toward COP31, while the IPCC convenes its first expert meeting specifically devoted to water and climate change.
The U.N. Human Rights Council opens a month-long session in Geneva on Monday, with environmental health, water, climate finance and nuclear legacies among the issues that will intersect with its broader human rights agenda.
The 81st session of the U.N. General Assembly opens in New York on Tuesday, beginning a month that will culminate in high-level meetings on climate action, sea-level rise and pandemic preparedness alongside the annual general debate. The general debate begins Sept. 22.
And toward the end of the week, leaders of the expanded BRICS grouping are expected to meet in New Delhi, with innovation, resilience and sustainability among the priorities.
Major processes to watch
China — Kunming Dialogue examines collective progress on biodiversity
Countries meet in Kunming through Wednesday for an informal technical dialogue supporting the first global review of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.
The process brings governments together with scientists, Indigenous peoples and local communities, businesses, finance and other participants to consider collective progress toward the framework’s 2030 targets.
The important question is what the accumulated evidence says about progress at the global level — and how that assessment should shape the next stage of international biodiversity policy.
Azerbaijan — Climate Week builds toward COP31
Governments, international organizations, businesses and other participants gather in Baku for the second U.N. Climate Week of 2026, intended to connect decisions taken through the formal climate negotiations with action on the ground.
The Sept. 7–11 meeting will focus on turning international climate decisions into practical action while generating targeted input for COP31, which opens in Antalya, Turkey, in November.
The meeting provides an intermediate stage between formal negotiating sessions: a place to identify obstacles involving finance, capacity, data and implementation before governments return to the negotiating table later this year.
Geneva — Space security moves from threats to verification
UNIDIR brings governments, researchers, industry and defense experts together on Tuesday and Wednesday as a growing reliance on satellites and the blurred boundary between civilian and military space systems raises new questions about stability in orbit.
Discussions range from threats to space infrastructure and strategic orbital capabilities to current negotiations on preventing an arms race in outer space. One particularly important question is whether sophisticated space-surveillance technologies can do more than prevent collisions: could they eventually help governments verify agreements or monitor compliance with norms of behavior?
The meeting also examines another emerging governance problem: private companies now operate infrastructure and generate data with strategic significance, complicating traditional assumptions about responsibility, neutrality and targetability in conflict.
Sri Lanka — IPCC turns to water in shaping its next climate assessment
The IPCC and International Water Management Institute convene about 60 experts in Colombo for the first IPCC expert meeting specifically devoted to advancing the science of water and climate change.
The Sept. 8–10 meeting will examine the current state of knowledge, identify research priorities and gaps, and generate evidence that could inform the IPCC’s Seventh Assessment Report. The discussions will consider water’s role in climate adaptation, resilience and risk, including the cascading and transboundary consequences of changes in water availability and distribution.
Participants will also develop a synthesis report on water, climate resilience, adaptation and equity. The work connects preparation of the next global climate assessment with wider international discussions over water security and governance.
UNGA watch — The 81st session opens
The 81st session of the U.N. General Assembly opens Tuesday, beginning the institutional run-up to high-level week.
The major political activity comes later: the general debate begins Sept. 22, alongside high-level meetings later that month on climate action, sea-level rise, pandemic preparedness and nuclear weapons.
Plastics treaty watch — Informal consultations continue
Heads of delegation to the negotiations for a global agreement on plastic pollution meet virtually Tuesday and Wednesday as efforts continue to find a path through unresolved differences in the treaty process.
The discussions are part of a series of informal meetings leading toward INC-5.4, scheduled for March 2027. The negotiating committee’s chair has proposed consultations every four to six weeks on priority areas, the roadmap and how the process should proceed.
The meeting does not represent a return to formal negotiations, but it provides another indication of whether governments can narrow differences before they do.
Security Council watch — Iran dispute leaves nuclear oversight in limbo
The Security Council returns to Iran’s nuclear program Thursday amid a deeper dispute over whether the sanctions committee it is scheduled to discuss legally exists.
France, the U.K., the U.S. and other Council members maintain that U.N. sanctions and the 1737 Committee were restored after European countries invoked the JCPOA’s snapback mechanism last year. China and Russia reject that interpretation and argue that the sanctions expired in October 2025. The disagreement has left the committee without an agreed chair and prevented its Panel of Experts from becoming operational.
The institutional paralysis comes as international nuclear monitoring has also been impaired. The International Atomic Energy Agency says it has lost continuity of knowledge across Iran’s declared nuclear facilities and cannot account for the size or whereabouts of the country’s enriched-uranium stockpile.
The dispute has spread beyond the Iran file, contributing to an unprecedented delay in appointing chairs for Security Council subsidiary bodies and constraining the work of sanctions committees and other oversight mechanisms.
Separately, members are expected to continue discussing a Greek-drafted resolution on the impact of digital technologies on violations against children in armed conflict, bringing questions of technology governance into the Council’s established children-and-armed-conflict agenda.
Signals
The biodiversity framework is moving into a different test: not setting global targets, but determining collectively whether the evidence shows countries are on course to meet them.
Water is moving closer to the center of the next IPCC assessment as scientists examine how changes in the hydrological cycle cascade through food, ecosystems, economies and adaptation.
Climate diplomacy between COPs includes meetings designed to connect negotiated decisions with the practical obstacles governments face in carrying them out.
Improved space surveillance could become part of the verification architecture for future international rules governing activity in orbit.
On the calendar
Sept. 7–8 — Minamata Convention Implementation and Compliance Committee (Virtual)
The treaty’s compliance body reviews implementation issues as new national reporting feeds into the first evaluation of whether the Minamata Convention is proving effective. → Meeting information
Sept. 7–9 — Kunming Dialogue 2026 (Kunming, China)
Countries and other participants examine collective progress toward the 23 targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework as part of preparations for its global review. → Meeting information
Sept. 7–11 — U.N. Climate Week (Baku, Azerbaijan)
Governments and other participants work on translating international climate decisions into action and generating input for COP31 in November. → Meeting information
Sept. 7–Oct. 7 — U.N. Human Rights Council, 63rd session (Geneva)
The Council opens a month-long session spanning global human rights crises alongside issues including hazardous substances and wastes, water and sanitation, climate finance and the human rights consequences of nuclear legacies. → Meeting information
Sept. 8 — U.N. General Assembly 81st session opens (New York)
The General Assembly begins its annual session ahead of the general debate and a series of high-level meetings later in September. → Meeting information
Sept. 8–9 — Plastics treaty heads-of-delegation meeting (Virtual)
Negotiators hold informal consultations on the roadmap toward the next formal session of negotiations on a global agreement on plastic pollution. → Meeting information
Sept. 8–9 — UNIDIR Outer Space Security Conference (Geneva)
Governments, researchers and industry experts examine threats to space systems, strategic stability, efforts to prevent an arms race in outer space and technologies for monitoring and verifying activity in orbit. → Program
Sept. 8–10 — IPCC-IWMI Expert Meeting on Water and Climate Change (Colombo, Sri Lanka)
About 60 experts identify research gaps and priorities on water, climate risk, adaptation and resilience that could inform the IPCC Seventh Assessment Report. → Meeting information
Sept. 12–13 — BRICS Summit (New Delhi)
Leaders are expected to discuss cooperation spanning innovation, AI, digital infrastructure, climate, energy, health and economic resilience. → Schedule
Aug. 10–Oct. 2 — IPCC Working Group I First Order Draft expert review (Global)
Experts continue reviewing the first draft of the physical science contribution to the IPCC Seventh Assessment Report. → Review information
Closing
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