US, China blame each other for slow climate talks

Tini Tran, Associated Press Yahoo News 9 Oct 10;

TIANJIN, China – Modest progress at U.N. climate talks Saturday was overshadowed by a continuing deadlock between China and the United States, clouding prospects for a major climate conference in Mexico in less than two months' time.

Marred by an atmosphere of mistrust, negotiations have made limited headway as the world's two largest emitters of greenhouse gases blamed each other for holding up talks.

Chief U.S. negotiator Jonathan Pershing said he was disappointed by the resistance of China and other developing nations to a major issue: allowing the monitoring and verification of their efforts to curb the greenhouse gas emissions that are blamed for global warming.

"We have made very little progress on the key issue that confronts us," he said. "These elements are a part of the deal. The lack of progress on these gives us concern about the prospects for Cancun."

Meanwhile his Chinese counterpart, Su Wei, hit back, charging developed countries with failing to commit to substantial reductions in carbon emissions while making unfair demands of developing nations. He accused the U.S. of using the transparency issue to avoid its own responsibilities to cut emissions and provide financing and technology to poor countries.

"After five years of negotiation, we have seen slow or no progress. The developed countries are trying every means possible to avoid discussion of the essential issue — that is emission reductions," he said.

The public rift over long-standing divisions between rich and poor nations threatens to jeopardize the possibility of progress at the Cancun meeting.

Delegates from more than 150 nations have been negotiating in China's northeastern city of Tianjin for the past week, working to lay the groundwork for the meeting in Mexico that starts Nov. 29.

The U.N. talks aim to secure a binding deal to curb greenhouse gases that cause global warming, but countries disagree on how to split the burden of emission cuts and how to verify them. The talks are intended to find a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol, which legally mandated modest emissions reductions and expires in 2012.

Since a binding global deal is largely out of reach for this year's meeting, negotiators have been focusing on less contentious initiatives that can lay the foundation for a legal framework that could be approved later, possibly in South Africa in 2011.

On their final day of talks, negotiators said modest progress had been made on establishing a climate fund to help poor nations, drawing up guidelines on sharing technology and deforestation issues, but expressed frustration at the overall gridlock.

"We have over the last week seen some progress but progress was slow and uneven," said EU negotiator Peter Wittoeck. "We think that a big effort will still be needed to crystallize options ... in Cancun.

Environmental groups were divided in their assessment of the week's talks, with many openly criticizing the bickering and posturing that characterized negotiations.

"At times, it has been like watching children in a kindergarten," said Wendel Trio, international climate policy director with Greenpeace.

However, others were less pessimistic, arguing that the detailed work of putting together draft proposals for Cancun has moved forward.

"We have heard of a lot of division and argument, but much of that has been performance and part of the negotiations here. Behind the scenes, they have been getting down to work this week," said Julie-Ann Richards of Climate Action Network.

Expectations had not been high coming into these negotiations, but U.N. climate chief Christiana Figueres said that despite disagreements, progress had been made in Tianjin.

"This week has got us closer to a structured set of decisions that can be agreed to in Cancun. Governments addressed what is doable in Cancun, and what may have to be left to later," she said.

Last year's U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen disappointed many environmentalists and political leaders when it failed to produce a legally binding treaty on curbing the greenhouse gases.

Scientists have warned that global warming could lead to widespread drought, floods, higher sea levels and worsening storms. Even a 3.6-degree-Fahrenheit (2-degree-Celsius) temperature rise could subject up to 2 billion people to water shortages by 2050, a U.N. panel has said.

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Associated Press Writer Joe McDonald contributed to this report.


Climate talks marred by bickering, progress on finance
* China dismisses U.S. criticism of its climate policy
* Negotiator says comments exposes U.S. inaction
* Talks in northern Chinese city draw to a subdued close
* U.S. negotiator sees elements of deal under threat (Updates throughout with results from talks)
Chris Buckley Reuters AlertNet 9 Oct 10;

TIANJIN, China, Oct 9 (Reuters) - China hit back on Saturday at U.S. claims it was shirking in the fight against climate change, likening the criticisms to a mythic pig preening itself.

Frustration between the world's two top carbon polluters overshadowed week-long U.N. talks seeking progress on the shape of a new climate pact, with negotiators making some progress on financing but failing to dispel fears the process could end in deadlock.

Su Wei, a senior Chinese climate change negotiator, swiped at comments from top U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern as the climate change talks drew to a close in the north Chinese city of Tianjin.

Stern, in remarks at a U.S. university, said Beijing could not insist rich nations take on fixed targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions while China and other big emerging nations adopt only voluntary domestic goals.

Su countered that Stern's claims were a diversion from the United States' failure to make big cuts in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases causing global warming.

Su likened the U.S. criticism to Zhubajie, a pig in a classic Chinese novel, which in a traditional saying preens itself in a mirror.

"It has no measures or actions to show for itself, and instead it criticises China, which is actively taking measures and actions," Su said of the United States.

The talks in Tianjin reached firmer agreement on funding for poor countries hit by global warming, green technology transfers, and other steps intended to build momentum for more high-level treaty talks in Cancun, Mexico, from the end of next month.

Cancun is meant to be the stepping stone to a legally binding deal next year that would lock in governments into reducing greenhouse gas pollution holding heat in the atmosphere and threatening to tip over into dangerous global warming.

Officials and activists in Tianjin said they were frustrated that more was not agreed in sessions that often dwelt on procedures. Talks on protecting carbon-absorbing rainforests languished.

NEED FOR SPEED

"We're moving in the right direction, but we certainly need to put our foot on the accelerator," said Julie-Anne Richards of the Climate Action Network, which monitored the talks.

Progress this week should lead to some decisions in Cancun, said Wendel Trio, Greenpeace International climate policy director, but he pointed to the bickering that has dominated the Tianjin meeting. "At times it has been like watching children in a kindergarten," he said.

The jabs between Beijing and Washington exposed a rift likely to keep dogging talks: to what extent China should be regarded in treaties as an emerging economy free of fixed greenhouse gas reduction goals.

The first phase of the Kyoto Protocol, the U.N.'s main weapon against climate change, ends in 2012 and what follows from 2013 is under contention.

The Protocol makes an either-or distinction between rich countries, which take on fixed targets to cut emissions, and developing countries, including China. The U.S. is not a party.

Nearly 200 governments failed to agree last year on a new legally binding deal. A meeting in Copenhagen last December ended in bitter exchanges between rich and developing countries and created a loose accord with many gaps.

Stern accused Beijing of sliding away from the Copenhagen Accord and said it established that China should be treated much like other big polluters.

China has said it will not accept such a change.

China also demands that advanced economies, responsible for most of the industrial pollution fuelling global warming, must commit to deep cuts in emissions, giving poorer societies more room to grow their economies and greenhouse gas output.

The top U.S. negotiator in Tianjin, Jonathan Pershing, demanded China and other big emerging nations expose their domestic emissions goals to tighter international scrutiny and put them in a new binding pact that succeeds Kyoto.

"These elements are at the heart of the deal and the lack of progress on them gives us concern," Pershing told reporters.

"The danger we face now is that the essential balance that allowed progress to be made is in jeopardy." (Editing by David Fogarty)

UN climate talks in China end without breakthrough
Roger Harrabin BBC News 9 Oct 10;

UN climate talks in China have ended without a major breakthrough and with angry words about the US from Beijing.

At the talks in Tianjin, China blamed the US for failing to meet its responsibilities to cut emissions and for trying to overturn UN principles.

The US accused China of refusing to have its voluntary energy savings verified internationally.

But there was some progress toward the next round of climate talks in Mexico in November.

There are hopes that the meeting in Cancun could agree details of a fund to transfer $100bn (£63bn) a year from rich countries to help poor nations cope with the projected consequences of climate change.

That sum is described by developing nations as substantial but inadequate.
'Preening pig'

It has been the old deadlock in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin during the week-long talks.

China feels unfairly criticised by the US.

On Saturday, one of the Chinese climate negotiators reportedly accused the US of behaving like a preening pig, complaining about Beijing when Washington had done so little itself.

The head of the US delegation, Jonathan Pershing, was more diplomatic.

But he said that there could be no US signature on any binding deal that did not also bind China - America's superpower rival.

Despite general frustration at the superpower stand-off, there was some progress in Tianjin.

If the $100bn fund can be agreed in Cancun, it will prove that these talks are not dead.

If even this part of the package falls, diplomats in Tianjin are warning it will threaten the future of multilateral action between nations of the world on anything.