A yearly review of countries' greenhouse gas emissions cut pledges under an extension to the global climate pact the Kyoto Protocol could be a way to raise climate ambitions, the European Union's lead climate negotiator said on Wednesday.

Negotiators from over 180 countries are meeting in Bonn, Germany, until Friday to work towards getting a new global climate pact signed by 2015 and to ensure ambitious emissions cuts are made after the Kyoto Protocol expires at the end of this year.

Over the past two years, the FAO and RECOFTC – The Center for People and Forests have brought together regional experts to reflect on the outcomes of the 15th and 16th Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The resulting booklets Forests and Climate Change After Copenhagen: An Asia-Pacific Perspective and Forests and Climate Change After Cancun: An Asia-Pacific Perspective were distributed widely and very well received.

A row over planning how to bind all emitters under a global climate pact from 2020 at U.N. climate talks in Germany is blocking negotiations to deepen nearer term emission cuts and raise cash to help poor countries cope with a warming planet, the EU said Tuesday.

Delegates have failed to start work on a new Durban Platform negotiation track after four days of talks in Bonn spent arguing over an agenda to organize work this year and appoint a chair to steer the process.

This report provides an analysis of the tools and tactics advocacy groups use to influence policy responses to climate change at international, regional, national and sub-national levels. More than 20 climate networks and their member organisations have contributed to the report with their experiences of advocacy on climate change, including over 70 case studies from a wide range of countries - including many of the poorest - in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Pacific.

Indonesia's government said on Monday it would protect a strip of peatland in Aceh province at the centre of an international storm over palm oil development, in a case that had become a test of the country's commitment to halt deforestation.

Indonesia imposed a two-year moratorium on clearing forest last May under a $1 billion climate deal with Norway aimed at reducing emissions from deforestation, but the former governor of the country's westernmost Aceh province breached the ban by issuing a permit to a palm oil firm to develop the peatland.

As climate change negotiators settle into their familiar roles at their first major meeting since COP 17 in Durban, South Africa, climate watchers will have their eyes fixed on the 14-25 May UNFCCC gathering in Bonn, Germany to see how the tenuous December deal - struck by sleep-deprived negotiators at the eleventh hour - is settling in six months on. With continued economic hardship among Annex I (developed) countries, this year's Bonn meeting will be a telling barometer for what to expect when parties meet in Doha this November for COP 18.

NEW DELHI: On the second day of the Bonn climate change negotiations, the US, the EU and other developed countries tried to stall discussions on whether the rich countries had met their obligations on reducing emissions and financing the poor countries. Many developed countries pushed for talks to take place only on a new single legal treaty that would wipe out all past and existing obligations.

The Durban Climate Change Conference held last December 2011 had all the elements of a highly charged political drama: global leaders in a high-stakes game to save the world, the palatable tension over clashing interests, claims of sabotage and backdoor deals juxtaposed with impassioned demonstrations and panicky news blitzes, the climax into near-chaos, the last-ditch effort for compromise now known as the “huddle”, and, of course, the miraculous “save”. Then ominously, though probably anticipated, big questions emerge as the screen fades to black. This paper is divided into two parts.

New Delhi: In climate talks beginning on Monday in Bonn, India will oppose the EU’s move to start negotiations on the draft of a new climate protocol in 2012 itself. Considering it another shift in the goalpost by the Europeans, the Indian team of negotiators is expected to point out that no consensus was built at Durban last year that the only way forward is a new protocol that renders Kyoto Protocol redundant.

14 May 2012

As all countries take actions to reduce emissions the unresolved question is to what extent fairness will be the basis for international cooperation

Pages