BONN, Jun 12 (IPS) - A leading global environmental group has accused the United States of holding up UN climate negotiations.Friends of the Earth Malaysia's honorary secretary Meena Raman said that throughout the second round of the United Nations climate talks in Bonn that ended Jun. 12, the U.S. administration had blocked progress to move negotiations forward. Delegates from 183 countries meeting in Bonn discussed key negotiating texts which will serve as the basis for an international climate change deal due to be reached at a meeting in Copenhagen Dec. 7-18. The Copenhagen meeting would seek to bring an international agreement to follow the Kyoto Protocol, which expires at the end of 2012. The 12-day gathering in former West German capital Bonn this month was attended by more than 4,600 participants, including government delegates, and representatives from business and industry, environmental organisations and research institutions. Rather than show global leadership, the Obama administration failed to live up to its responsibility as the world's largest historical greenhouse gas polluter, Raman told reporters Jun. 12. "This strategy damages the prospects for a just, equitable, and effective outcome" at the key UN conference planned in Copenhagen, she added. Echoing general disappointment with the new U.S. administration, Karen Orenstein of Friends of the Earth U.S. said: "The election of President (Barack) Obama created tremendous hope worldwide that the U.S. would finally play a leadership role in solving the climate crisis that - more than any other nation on earth - it is responsible for causing. "Unfortunately for the survival of people and the planet, the Obama administration's position at these UN negotiations sounds frighteningly similar to that of (former U.S. president) George Bush."
BEIJING, Jun 13 (IPS) - As the December deadline for reaching a global climate deal in Copenhagen approaches, China is claiming leadership - rallying emerging economies to defend their rights to development and strike bargaining positions with rich nations. While a string of U.S. top envoys have been visiting Beijing over recent weeks in attempt to negotiate a preliminary agreement with China that would lay the foundations for Copenhagen talks, in a first China has hosted climate change negotiators from the largest developing countries. In late May envoys from Brazil, India and South Africa took part in a meeting titled "Towards Copenhagen: Developing Countries and Climate Change," organised by the Shanghai Institute for International Studies and attended by China's climate change negotiator at the Foreign Ministry Yu Qingtai. It is at that meeting that Yu first elaborated China's position on climate change that diplomats meeting with U.S. negotiators on global warming this week have been repeating. Yu spoke of the world's "common but differentiated responsibilities" when it comes to actions to prevent climate change. He said China was acting according to its "national conditions," and considering the lack of international consensus on preventing climate change Beijing's domestic efforts to reduce emissions were praiseworthy and "undeniable." Yu also rallied developing nations to be "united" in facing the global warming challenge - giving priority to their right to develop and eradicate poverty. "Without development, we will lose everything, including the ability to contribute to the global fight on climate change," Yu told delegates at the meeting. The same line of thought underlies tense talks on climate policy held between Washington and Beijing this week. U.S. special climate envoy Todd Stern's two-day visit to Beijing was perceived as aiming to press rapidly-growing China to commit to hard numbers on greenhouse gas emissions under the next global warming agreement.
Li Gao, acting chief of the Chinese delegation, told Xinhua at the end of the second round of the U.N. climate talks that limited progress was made at the latest negotiating session, including working out a draft document comprising various positions of parties involved in the talks.
"However, this negotiating process also reveals a lack of political will on the part of developed nations to fulfil obligations required by the Framework Convention," he said.
While trying to weaken their targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions and weaken their obligations to provide funds and technologies to help developing countries adapt to climate change, Li said, developed countries are also attempting to pass their burden of emissions reductions to developing countries.
Li also noted that the current negotiating text still includes many of developed countries' proposals that are at odds with the principles in the "Bali Road Map" and the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Progress towards a global treaty to fight climate change took an important step forward today when the US said it would not demand that China commits to binding cuts of its greenhouse gas emissions.
Jonathan Pershing, head of the US delegation in Bonn, said developing nations - seeking to grow their economies and alleviate poverty - would instead be asked to commit to other actions. These include boosting energy efficiency standards and improving the take-up of renewable energy, but would not deliver specific reductions. He said: "We're saying that the actions of developing countries should be binding, not the outcomes of those actions."
When will people in the rest of the world stop waiting for the US to lead them to do what they want to do? The brainless should not be in banking. — Willem Buiter
