Brussels, 12/12/2011 (Agence Europe) - Just a little is better than nothing, particularly when nothing was narrowly avoided. Although everybody agrees that the agreement reached on Sunday morning at the UN climate conference in Durban (COP 17) lacks ambition, the European Union, which feared the worst until the very last minute - the breakdown of Durban and legal void created by the expiry of the Kyoto Protocol in a year's time - welcomes the result as a “historic breakthrough for the climate”, even though binding agreements for 2020 are still to come. It took negotiators two sleepless nights beyond the fortnight of negotiations to get all countries of the world to snatch a minimum agreement to save the Kyoto Protocol post-2012 and agree on a roadmap to guide all the countries of the world - including the United States, China and India - in their preparations for a new, legally-binding international treaty to be concluded in 2015, to enter into force in 2020. This was the minimum called for by the EU in order to be able to get behind it (see EUROPE No 10502).
The 196 parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) also managed - in between other technical decisions to implement the Cancún agreements (COP 16 of last year) - to make the Green Climate Fund agreed in Copenhagen (COP 15 in 2009) operational, which will be supported by the developed countries to the tune of US$100 billion per year from 2020 onwards, to support the attenuation and adaptation efforts of the developing countries. The €50 million pledged by Germany and the €15 million promised by Denmark helped towards this step forward.
In the view of Connie Hedegaard, Climate Action Commissioner, “The EU's strategy worked. When many parties after Cancún said that Durban could only implement decisions taken in Copenhagen and Cancún, the EU wanted more ambition. And got more. We would not take a new Kyoto period unless we got in return a roadmap for the future where all countries commit. Where Kyoto divides the world into two categories, we will now get a system that reflects the reality of today's mutually interdependent world. And as we are interdependent, what we promise to do must have the same legal weight. With the agreement on a roadmap towards a new legal framework by 2015 that will involve all countries in combating climate change, the EU has achieved its key goal”. On behalf of the Polish Presidency of the Council, Marcin Korolec, the Polish Minister for the Environment, stressed that “the Durban platform will lead us all to a binding agreement and sees this unexpected result of the success of the European Union and the international community as a whole”.
The MEP Karl-Heinz Florenz, EPP (Germany), a member of the parliamentary delegation to Durban, is delighted that “all the big emitters are on board”. He described the result in these terms: “It is less than we could have dreamt of, but a great deal more than we expected”. Kriton Arsenis, (S&D, Greece), is aware that there is much criticism for the wording and shortcomings of the agreement. “It is clear that as humanity, we have just decided to ensure our own safety. We will now have the opportunity to fight with determination to make sure that the details are up to the task at hand”, she said. For once, the Greens/EFA group congratulated the EU which, with the support of the islands and the most fragile nations, “has done all in its power to reach an agreement including all parties - an agreement, however, which has delayed the main points until later”. The group states that the EU has shown leadership in the multilateral process. “Under the circumstances of these negotiations, we can be proud to be European and of having been able to impose the need for a global vision for the behaviour and mechanisms needed to fight global warming. We can be proud of the responsible and pioneering position the EU has taken, without which no decision, however insufficient, would have been possible”, said Sandrine Bélier (France). Yannick Jadot (France), said that “this unsatisfactory agreement must serve as a basis for the states to take individual responsibility. It has become clear that we can no longer just count on the UN process, but need to find other ways of responding to the climate emergency”.
A dangerous loophole. The environmental NGOs are far from relieved. “The bad news is that the countries blocking the negotiations, led by the United States, have managed to insert a vital get-out clause into the agreement, which will easily allow them to prevent the next major climate agreement from being legally binding. If they make use of this loophole, it would be a disaster”, warns Greenpeace International. (AN/transl.fl)