David Fogarty and Thin Lei Win, Reuters 30 Sep 09;
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Negotiators at U.N. climate talks on Wednesday tried to break the deadlock on finance and steps to cut greenhouse gas emissions as a string of reports warned of dire consequences from global warming.
Delegates from about 180 nations are meeting in the Thai capital to try to narrow differences over how to share the burden in the fight against climate change before a December deadline to agree on a broad outline of a pact to replace the Kyoto Protocol.
Finance for poorer states to adapt to rising seas and greater extremes of weather and to green their economies will be key to an agreement that all nations can sign to succeed Kyoto after its first phase ends in 2012.
"People are getting more into the text, it's not procedural," said Michael Zammit Cutajar, the head of a key U.N. negotiating group, referring to 180-page draft text on a new agreement that negotiators are trying to trim down.
"It's not the pressing issues as much as it is in the way certain alternatives are put forward," he told Reuters.
"What I think is more interesting is that some really big political issues have come out into the open," said Zammit Cutajar, who heads a negotiating group looking at nations' long-term actions to brake the pace of climate change.
A second group is looking at ways for rich nations bound by emissions targets under Kyoto to toughen those targets, leading to a two-track negotiation process.
"One is the linkage between the two tracks of the negotiation with some parties that haven't said so clearly before saying we want this to end up with one agreement, not two," he said referring to the EU, though many developing nations resist this.
"And also we've seen the idea coming from the U.S., Australia and others that there should be a common framework in which mitigation actions are undertaken by all parties, different mitigation actions according to national circumstances and capabilities but the same legal framework."
Mitigation refers to actions to cut or limit greenhouse gas emissions, such as investing in wind farms, energy efficiency or clean-coal power stations.
He said a U.S. proposal involved an appendix bound by the same legal language in which all countries list what they are prepared to do. "So that finally has come on to the table. And these things have to be resolved before we have agreement."
The U.N. wants nations to settle on an outline on a new climate pact during a December 7-18 meeting in Copenhagen.
FOOD AND FLOODS
The United States never ratified Kyoto but delegates say the world's number two emitter is key to any deal and Democrats in the U.S. Senate are expected to unveil a bill aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions over the next four decades.
Underscoring the growing threat from climate change, a World Bank study on Wednesday said poor countries would need to spend as much as $100 billion annually over the next 40 years to adapt to more extreme weather and rising seas.
Global warming will also cut into world grain yields and result in less food being available in the developing world in 2050, the International Food Policy Research Institute said in a report.
The Philippines also called on rich nations at the climate talks to toughen emissions cuts, saying the deadly floods brought about by a typhoon that hit the country this week was a taste of future effects of climate change on poor nations.
Indonesia on Wednesday pointed to progress at the Bangkok talks but didn't expect clarity on financing until Copenhagen.
"It doesn't look like it's going to be happening, though we do want to have it as soon as possible but other parties will take hostage some of the issues until their demand has been fulfilled," said Agus Purnomo, head of Indonesia's delegation.
"We'll see people releasing their hostages only the last six hours of the negotiation (in Copenhagen)," he told Reuters.
Large annual sums are a key demand for poor nations.
The chair of the G77 plus China negotiating group said rich nations must pledge at least 5 percent of their GDP over the next three to four decades to address the threats from climate change.
"The issue of finance and technology transfer are at the heart, in fact they are the first building blocks, for a successful architecture for a future deal," Lumumba D'Aping of Sudan told reporters.
(Additional reporting by Charles Abbott in Washington; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)
