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November 25, 2013

Warsaw Climate Summit Yields Modest Deal on Emissions Announcements, Loss and Damage 
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The U.N. climate summit in Warsaw, Poland, came to a close over the
weekend with a deal that continues to delay major action on global
warming. Countries agreed to a deadline of early 2015 for publishing
their targets for cutting emissions by the year 2020. Those targets will
then be used to hammer out a global accord at the end of 2015 when the
U.N. climate summit is held in France. The United Nations' top climate
official, Christiana Figueres, said unlike the Kyoto Protocol, the next
global climate deal should include emissions cuts from developing
countries.

Christiana Figueres "What I think is very important is to realize that
what remains unchanged is the fact that industrialized countries with a
larger historical responsibility must take the lead. But that doesn't
mean that everybody else is off the hook. The fact is, that every single
country, small or large, every single sector, every single city, has to
contribute because otherwise we're not going to be able to change the
trajectory of greenhouse gases."

Critics of the current roadmap for 2015 say it will let the world's
biggest polluters set insufficient cuts. Warsaw also the establishment
of a new "loss and damage" mechanism to deliver aid to countries
impacted by climate change. But the world's biggest polluters, including
the United States, continued to reject demands that such aid be deemed
compensation for their record emissions. Looking ahead to 2015, the U.S.
climate envoy, Todd Stern, said the talks face a continued divide
between developed and developing nations.

Todd Stern: "As countries think forward about what might happen in
Paris, there were some quite clear differences in the way that different
countries conceived the structure of an agreement. In particular with
respect to the classic developed/developing country divide."

The Warsaw climate summit saw an unprecedented walkout of both
developing countries and dozens of environmental and civil society
groups in protest of rich countries' alleged inaction. In a statement,
the group Friends of the Earth said: "The only success of the dirtiest
climate conference on record is the fact that civil society walked out
and started a domino effect already reaching our home countries, where
ordinary citizens are joining the struggle for climate justice."

 

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