IPCC chair Rajendra Pachauri to miss key climate meeting over sexual harassment allegations

The chair of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, has pulled out of a high level meeting of the organisation after police in India began investigating an allegation of sexual harassment against him. Pachauri, 74, is accused of sexually harassing a 29-year-old female researcher from soon after she joined his Delhi-based research group, The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri). The lawyers for the woman, who cannot be named, said the harassment by Pachauri included unwanted emails, text messages and WhatsApp messages. Pachauri, one of the UN’s top climate change officials, has denied the charges, in his legal defence. His lawyers claimed in the court documents that his emails, mobile phone and WhatsApp messages were hacked and that criminals accessed his computer and phone to send the messages in an attempt to malign him. An IPCC spokesman said: “[Pachauri] has informed the IPCC that he will be unable to chair the plenary session of the IPCC in Nairobi because of issues demanding his attention in India.” A spokesman for Pachauri said: “[He] is committed to provide all assistance and cooperation to the authorities in their ongoing investigations.” Pachauri has chaired the IPCC since 2002, during which time it has taken the lead in the scientific assessment of the causes and risks of climate change. Its reports are written and reviewed by thousands of scients and approved by the IPCC’s 194 member nations. The most recent report concluded that climate change is set to inflict “severe, widespread, and irreversible impacts” on people and the natural world unless carbon emissions are cut sharply and rapidly. The IPCC was jointly awarded the Nobel peace prize with former US vice-president Al Gore in 2007 for their part in driving international action against climate change. In Pachauri’s absence, IPCC vice-chair Dr Ismail El Gizouli will preside over the four-day meeting in Kenya, beginning on Tuesday, which will discuss the future form of the IPCC’s reports. Pachauri’s term as IPCC chair ends in October and he had already indicated he would not seek another term. The IPCC is widely seen as the foremost authority on the science of climate change. But it suffered a public relations disaster in 2010 after its small staff poorly handled a mistake in a major IPCC report that wrongly stated all glaciers in the Himalayas would melt by 2035. Pachauri has also been attacked personally, with allegations in 2010 that he financially profited from the influence of his UN role and wore “$1,000 dollar suits”. A KPMG audit cleared Pachauri. “They can’t attack the science so they attack the chairman,” he said in 2010.