BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) — World leaders gather Tuesday at the United Nations annual climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, but unlike past climate talks with the star power of the football World Cup, big names and powerful countries are noticeably absent.

But 2024’s climate talks are more like the World Chess Federation finals; It’s missing recognizable names but big on geek power and strategy. Top leaders of the 13 top carbon dioxide polluters will not appear as their countries are responsible for more than 70% of the heat-trapping gases in 2023.

The biggest polluters and most powerful economies, China and the United States, are not sending their No. 1s. Leaders in the four most populous countries, home to more than 42 percent of the world’s population, are not speaking.

“This is symptomatic of the lack of political will to act. There’s no sense of urgency,” said climate scientist Bill Hare, CEO of Climate Analytics. He said this explains “the absolute mess we find ourselves in.”

Among the approximately 50 leaders who will speak on Tuesday are Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

But a strong showing is expected from the leaders of some of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries. The presidents of several small island nations and more than a dozen leaders from countries across Africa will speak at the two-day World Leaders Summit at the COP29 conference.

In an indication of how the bar has fallen for celebrities, photographers and video cameras raced alongside a leader as he walked through meeting halls on Tuesday morning. He was the emergency management minister of the host country, Azerbaijan.

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