By Ramesh Mathew/Staff Reporter
Developed countries, notably the USA, EU members and Japan came in for sharp criticism yesterday from non-governmental organisations (NGOs) for what they described as “their failure to adhere to the requirements of the world” and running away from the real issues concerning emissions in their territories.
Leading the tirade against the developed countries, director of the Kuala Lumpur- headquartered Third World Network (TWN) Meena Raman said the NGOs across the world are disappointed at the rather indifferent response of the developed world to such a burning issue as emission.
“At a time when the members are only a few weeks away from signing a new protocol based on the deliberations of the Doha conference, we are extremely disappointed at the poor response from the developed world to the commitments that they made in Durban more than a year ago,” said Raman at a gathering held alongside the main plenary session yesterday. The new commitments need to made on January 1, 2013.
The speaker came down heavily on the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Switzerland and Japan for their varying stance which she said gave an impression to the whole world that they are still not committed to find effective solutions to such a burning issue as carbon emission.
“While the US is no party at all to the protocol, New Zealand, Australia and Switzerland have still made no commitment so far,” she said while adding that Canada is toeing a line similar to that of the US.
She said even though EU members have made a commitment to achieve a reduced emission levels by 20% by 2020 in comparison to the figures of 2005, Raman said they had already reached that level long ago and it is meaningless to expect the same levels of reduction in the coming eight years from the EU members.
“Parties agreed in Durban last year that there would a CP2 but what was not decided was its length (whether a 5 or 8 year period) and what the actual numbers for the emission reduction targets, both individually and in aggregate”, she said.
Speaking later, representatives of NGOs Branden Nu (Action Aid), Nicas Hallstrom (What Next Forum), and Dale Wen (International Forum for Globalisation) also echoed similar feelings while mentioning the strides made by other countries, notably China on the issue.
While comparing the initiatives made by China and US on the issue of reduction of emissions, Wen said China had set apart a budget of $600mn in its fight against emission related issues. She said the US had pledged to raise $30bn for the issue at Durban, literally no efforts have come from its side so far, she said.
While highlighting the case for what he referred to as “climate finance”, Brendon Nu said there is great need for countries setting apart separate fund to fight the issues related to climate change. He also said the larger the plan of every government on this core, more expensive that they would be.
He also wondered how and where all the money for fighting the issue is coming from.
Hallstrom called upon the EU nations to bring the level of emissions substantially from the prevailing levels. He also lamented that it seemed the EU countries has no effective plan for fighting the issue in the next 8 years.

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