Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan left shortly before Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides arrived at the COP31 climate summit in Antalya, and Turkish delegates removed their interpretation headsets during Christodoulides’ speech, Greek outlet Newsbomb.gr reported on November 11, 2026.

Newsbomb said Erdoğan’s departure was intended to avoid an official welcome and the customary handshake. A lower-ranking Turkish official received Christodoulides instead, the outlet reported. It also said that members of the Turkish diplomatic delegation took off their headsets while the Cypriot leader was speaking. Azerbaijan’s delegation was in the hall and watched without reacting, according to the report.

The account did not include an explanation from Erdoğan or the Turkish delegation. The reported incidents took place as Christodoulides addressed the leaders’ summit at COP31, the United Nations climate conference.

Cyprus calls for faster climate action

Christodoulides urged countries to accelerate emissions cuts, move away from fossil fuels, triple renewable energy production capacity and double improvements in energy efficiency by 2030. He said international efforts were not yet enough to meet the Paris Agreement’s goals and called for more focus on putting climate commitments into practice.

He also said water scarcity, extreme temperatures, desertification and extensive fires were already a reality for Cyprus, making adaptation and resilience immediate national priorities. He argued that climate change crosses borders and that countries should work together to address it.

Regional initiatives

Christodoulides presented Cyprus’s climate initiative for the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. It brings together 10 partner countries and more than 200 regional scientific experts to work on adaptation, mitigation, resilience and early-warning systems, he said.

He also cited Cyprus’s Regional Aerial Firefighting Station, a joint initiative with Jordan supported by the European Commission that began operating earlier in 2026. Christodoulides said COP31’s success should be judged by how effective action is on the ground.