Posted on 10/31/2002 9:08:56 AM PST by Jakarta ex-pat
Nobody expected universal agreement. But to say that the latest round of climate talks being held in New Delhi have gone badly would be something of an understatement. Ministers from more than 170 countries are currently in India discussing a pressing international problem: what can be done to reduce global warming? The answer, it seems, is not much.
The summit - the latest in the United Nations climate change process - got off to a shaky start earlier this week when the Indian government excluded all reference to the Kyoto protocol from a draft declaration.
Delegates from the European Union expressed their disappointment, while Britain's environment minister, Margaret Beckett, said she was "slightly surprised" Kyoto had been dumped out of the draft.
It was not difficult to work out what had happened. The United States withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol - which calls on the developed world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions - earlier this year, when President George W Bush said the treaty was not in the US's economic interests. India regards the United States as its major ally.
The limp declaration, written by India's environment minister, T R Baalu, was clearly inspired by Washington, critics say. The draft made no mention of a future commitment to reduce pollution. Instead it stressed "adaptation" and sustainable development - shorthand for doing nothing about global warming other than to prepare for it. It was, in the words of one disgruntled European official,"crap".
On Wednesday the fading prospect of making meaningful progress on climate change more or less disappeared. India's elderly prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, addressing the conference, said that the developed world had no obligation to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. India could not afford to do anything about reducing them, and was, after all, only responsible for a fraction of global pollution, he argued.
"We do not believe that the ethos of democracy can support any norm other than equal per capita rights to global environmental resources," Mr Vajpayee said.
India's big task was to reduce poverty, he said. Since industrialised countries were responsible for most of the world's pollution, the onus fell on them to reduce emissions, he added.
His argument has a certain bleak logic to it: if the United States, the world's biggest polluter, is prepared to nothing about global warming why should a poor country like India put itself out?
Environment ministers from progressive countries like Britain and Canada have tried to sound upbeat in the wake of such unilateral declarations. But the suspicion is that the Kyoto Protocol - if not exactly dead - lies mortally wounded.
Mrs Beckett insisted earlier this week that the treaty could still make a difference, even without the United States. Other ministers expressed the hope that Mr Bush and Mr Vajpayee would eventually be won round to its virtues. This is a quixotic argument, and one suspects that even its advocates don't really believe it.
Environmental campaigners, meanwhile, have accused the United States of working behind the scenes to frustrate this week's talks.
"Why are the Americans here? It seems they are only here to sabotage, obstruct, weaken and delay proceedings," Steve Sawyer, of Greenpeace, said.
"They don't care about climate change, they don't care about the poor. who are the first and hardest hit; they only care about the bottom line of their fossil fuel pals like Exxon and Enron."
"Progress has been frustratingly slow on the detailed issues here in Delhi because of the usual sabotage from the usual suspects and a lack of political will from the rest, Sawyer added.
To reinforce their point, Greenpeace activists hung a banner from the Delhi hotel housing the US delegation. It read: "American climate criminals in town."
India's environment minister, meanwhile, is expected to come up with a new Delhi declaration, to be signed tomorrow, which makes glancing mention of the Kyoto protocol. But with the United States, Saudi Arabia and Australia refusing to ratify it, the declaration is virtually meaningless before the ink on it has dried.
As usual no substance, just "intellectual" verbal diarrhea.
To reinforce their point, Greenpeace activists hung a banner from the Delhi hotel housing the US delegation. It read: "American climate criminals in town."
If Islam is the major threat to the west, and this were a horse race...
Environmentalism would surely merit a photo finish.
You nailed it. Great line!
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