Via the GWPF – Paris Climate Poker On A Knife-Edge
£2.3 Trillion: Rich Countries’ Bill For Climate Deal
Britain and other rich countries face demands for $3.5 trillion (£2.3 trillion) in payments to developing nations to secure a deal in Paris to curb global warming.
Developing countries have added a clause to the latest draft of the text under which they would be paid the “full costs” of meeting plans to cut emissions. The amount paid by rich countries is a key unresolved issue at the climate conference in Paris, which is supposed to end tomorrow. The latest version of the text has more than 360 points of disagreement. –Ben Webster, The Times, 11 December 2015
The night saw an ugly brawl as US secretary of state John Kerry threatened that developed countries, including the US, would walk out of the agreement if it help up the wall of differentiation or if it was asked to commit to a road-map or a goal to deliver on its financial obligations in the Paris agreement. “You can take the US out of this. Take the developed world out of this. Remember, the Earth has a problem. What will you do with the problem on your own?” he said behind closed doors in negotiations to other ministers on the second revised draft of the Paris agreement. –Nitin Sethi, Business Standard, 11 December 2015
US Threatens To Walk Out If Financial Obligations Made Legally Binding
Business Standard, 11 December 2015
Nitin Sethi
Talks go beyond deadline as developed countries block differentiation in revised draft of Paris agreement and oppose financial road-map
Paris climate talks got pushed well beyond their scheduled deadline of Friday 6 pm. The French foreign minister Laruent Fabius formally announced that the next, and hopefully the final draft, of the Paris package would be brought out on Saturday morning followed by negotiations in afternoon. Bruised by the fractious arguments that had split countries along the developed-developing lines through the night between Thursday and Friday, many negotiators across the divide assessed that the talks would stretch in to Sunday.
The night saw an ugly brawl as US secretary of state John Kerry threatened that developed countries, including the US, would walk out of the agreement if it help up the wall of differentiation or if it was asked to commit to a road-map or a goal to deliver on its financial obligations in the Paris agreement. “You can take the US out of this. Take the developed world out of this. Remember, the Earth has a problem. What will you do with the problem on your own?” he said behind closed doors in negotiations to other ministers on the second revised draft of the Paris agreement.
He added, “We can’t afford in the hours we are left with to nit-pick every single word and to believe there is an effort here that separates developed countries from developing countries. That’s not where we are in 2015. Don’t think this agreement reflects that kind of differentiation.”
Making a veiled threat again that the agreement could fail if the US was pushed for financial obligations, Kerry said, “At this late hour, hope we don’t load this with differentiation…I would love to have a legally binding agreement. But the situation in the US is such that legally binding with respect to finance is a killer for the agreement.”
His remarks were made during the Indaba negotiations at the night between Thursday and Friday. Right after his short intervention Kerry left the negotiating room while other US delegates stayed back, making delegates from other countries point out that the sessions were to exchange views and not just threaten and leave.
Business Standard was able to confirm his remarks and other statements made during the night by speaking to multiple negotiators in the room during the night.
Kerry’s intervention was later followed by developed countries collectively refusing to give a road-map for delivery of their financial obligations behind 2020. EU said it was not acceptable and umbrella group of countries which includes the US too demanded scuttling such a plan.
IN the past the developed countries have been unable to deliver financial flows against their commitments of providing US $ 100 billion annually by 2020. The OECD produced a report recently claiming the rich world had delivered US $ 62 billion by 2014 which the rich countries showed off at the Paris talks. But developing countries, including India, noted gross levels of double accounting and counting of high interest loans as climate finance – which is seen as a reparation cost. The developing countries asked that a road-map for delivery of the US $ 100 billion be fixed at Paris and that the accounting rules too be set by the UN climate convention blocking attempts of creative accounting by developed countries. This was partially reflected in the second revised draft of the Paris agreement.
The proposal got the developed countries in a knot. One after the other each took the floor demanding that developing countries be asked to pay as well. The US went to the point of saying that at best the countries could ask for a one time goal being promised by developed countries in 2025. In other words developing countries would not be able to hold the developed world accountable for their financial commitments post-2025.
“Kerry’s statement against differentiation and legal obligations was shocking. They (developed countries) see this is an opportunity to walk away from their obligations. At all costs the developed countries want the rules rewritten in departure from all the principles and provisions of the convention,” said Meena Raman, from the observer group Third World Network.
The collective pushback from the developed countries got the rest of the developing countries together as well. Southern Sudan, a country formed only four years ago after strife and war, said, “Some developed countries are proposing all parties (countries) shall provide finances but many developing are poor vulnerable, with special circumstances and will not be able to pay for mitigation, adaptation and loss and damage because the amounts we are talking of are significant.”
He added, “We cannot afford to use the money for hospitals saving lives, providing education, water and schools to be used on these matters. The agreement needs to provide adequate predictable new additional and verifiable resources.”
Some of the umbrella group of countries also said they were not in favour of a review to see if the support provided for adaptation to climate change by developing countries was adequate or not.
India, China, Argentina and many other developing countries intervened through the night pushing for differentiation as well as explicit financial obligations from the rich world.
The talks remained inconclusive and the French foreign minister announced the extension of the talks beyond deadline promising to meet countries and groups in bilateral format through Friday and hope to produce the ultimate draft of the text on Saturday.
Key issues that have delayed the agreement
1. Should developed countries have a legal obligation to deliver finances against a road-map
2. Should developing countries that do not have historical responsibility for emissions also contribute to climate flows
3. Should the burden sharing in the agreement be based on self-differentiation based on current economic capacities or on both, historical emissions and current economic conditions
4. Should the actions of developing countries be linked, even if weakly, to the provision of finance and technology or should they be treated as par with developed countries during next ratchet up of emission reduction commitments
5. Should there be a periodic review of delivery of finance and technology by developed world or not
6. Should the long term goal of the agreement unambiguously be to keep global temperature rise below 1.5 degree by 2100 or should the agreement refer hedge on this goal
7. Should poor and vulnerable countries continue to hold rights to file for damages and liability against permanent loss and damage caused due to climate change
UN Climate Talks Deadlocked, Officially Delayed Until Saturday
The Times of India, 11 December 2015
Vishwa Mohan
The UN climate talks are officially delayed until Saturday. Overnight negotiations could not result into convergence on many issue.
Stage 5 of the UN Climate Ritual … breakthrough tomorrow?
The next and final text, which was supposed to come on Friday, will now be released on Saturday morning and discussion will begin over it the same afternoon to bring out a global deal latest by the evening to save the world from the impacts of climate change through countries’ post-2020 actions.
As overnight negotiations could not result into convergence on many issues, the French foreign minister and COP21 president Laurent Fabius had to officially announce this morning that he would not present the text on Friday evening as he had thought earlier (to meet the deadline as the Paris talks was scheduled to be concluded on Friday by arriving at an agreement).
As overnight negotiations ran on, Fabius will now present the final text on Saturday morning so that the talks would conclude by the evening.
He said, “There is still work to do. Things are going on in right direction”.
Most of the decisive issues are still open. It include the climate finance, transparency of action and the crucial one on how to share responsibility between developed and developing countries.
China has strong objections on differentiation as it thinks the second text that came on Thursday night was an attempt to dilute this provision. Egypt on behalf of African Group, on the other hand, wants the ‘greenhouse gas neutrality’ should be removed from the second version of the text.
Note: shortly after publication the first paragraph was reformatted to include some missing headline text.
By the way, thank you for presenting us a summary of the negotiations at Paris. I haven’t been able to find anything anywhere else.
The Circus of COP21 continues at le Bourget. It hass nothing to do with the Climate or CO2, it has descended into a battle of political Egos, and a mis-directed altruism which is only a sort of disguised fascism. The aim of the UN/IPCC is to churn money from country to country and remove a lot of it as it passes by them. The redistribution is achieved under the cloak of CAGW and when it is no longer needed it will be shed like an insect skin. It is in fact just a huge scam created by organised Banking Crime under the guise of Charity and pseudo-science.
And where do you think Obama and Kerry expect to get grants for their “foundation”s after office. The Clinton’s have made a killing skimming the world’s generosity. The hole of depravity has no floor, making it an abyss.
I’m guessing that many of the AGW leader aka Kerry ect…proponents from developed countries will start to “turn” as they realize the costs and will start looking a fraud/cooked data ect closely. Basically I reckon the AGW fraud will be over after this last AGW meeting re ~July 2016.
So the U.S. is expected to contribute trillions to “International Development” and “Climate Justice”.
Meanwhile, back at home…
http://www.ijreview.com/2014/06/145906-watch-city-detroit-fall-apart-eyes/
There have been episodes in recent decades of reparation settlements and payments by the U.S. government to tribal groups in formal proceedings. When the actual payouts took place to young and old members of the group there were runs on the car dealerships and liquor stores. Nothing much remains from those binges and rusted heaps today.
Dear humans,
There are no countries in Paris. Paris is a city, in a Country called France.
Mr. Obama is not the US, he is a man who might be extremely anxious to sign a legally binding agreement in our (citizens/bosses) names. If so, it will be signed.
Please stop thinking there are countries in Paris. It makes you very vulnerable to sucker punches, head fakes, back stabbing, etc, it seems to me. Stop thinking the people there ostensibly “negotiating” now, are connected to or represent anyone but the most powerful people in each country.
That said, this whole “Paris talks stalled” moment, looks like staged drama to me. Big shots anxious to sign a binding agreement, but wanting to make you believe their arms (and tender hearts) are being twisted by the poor people of earth, rather than them just plain betrayed you, again.
The 6 things you need to know about the Paris Climate Debacle by James Delingpole
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/12/11/cop21-six-things-need-know-paris-climate-debacle/
Really a very good short read.
Thanks for sharing that, Mark Stoval. Great read, indeed! James Delingpole is one of the finest writers (and thinkers) of his generation.
markstoval,
This (from the article) is blatantly illogical, to me;
“2; No serious person in the world believes in man-made climate change any more. They just don’t.”
“Essentially, China and India have got the Western nations over a barrel because, unlike the Western nations, they don’t believe in climate fairies and therefore feel they have no moral obligation to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions to save the world…”
Clearly, to me, it cannot be true that people who do not really believe in “climate fairies”, are, or feel they are, under any “moral obligation” to save anything from them.
Basic logical reasoning renders Mr Delingpole’s thoughts as he expressed them there, dumb (to put it in layman’s terms ; )
Something is wrong with his basic understanding of the world, it seems to me. I believe it is (to no small extent) a failure to recognize that much of the language we have been indoctrinated to “think with” is simply not rational.l.
That a few people in power, for example, are the countries they have power over. No they are not, and you literally have to be pretty dumb to believe they are, it seems inescapable to me But, we have been trained from birth essentially, to be that dumb.
I agree! Thanks for posting the link. The article deserves its own post.
The big question is…..do they reach an agreement
What a shame “Sunny” Justin Trudeau had left the Circus. No doubt, in exchange for a photo “op” he would likely have offered the trillion $$$$$$$$, without reference to the Canadians he recently left “in the dust”. He is a progressive in search of his image.
That is, he would love to commit instant financial suicide, but evil Congress would not let him.
This diplomatic development is nothing more than a “predictable surprise.”
Given 40,000 attendees for 11 days, and the US State Department per diem for Paris being $480/day, and average airfare for each delegate being $5,000 or more, The cost for the conference comes to $211 millions plus for per diem, and $200 million or airfares totals $411 million and counting. Not included are convention facilities, clean-up fort he city of Paris, limousines for high mucky-mucks, and so on. I guestimate this charade has cost the world $1 billion at least.
Kerry is saying some interesting things in recent days. It is almost as though he is backing down and having seconds about the issues.
Firstly there this , which others above have mentioned
“Sec. of State John Kerry: ‘The fact is that even if every American citizen biked to work, carpooled to school, used only solar panels to power their homes, if we each planted a dozen trees, if we somehow eliminated all of our domestic greenhouse gas emissions, guess what – that still wouldn’t be enough to offset the carbon pollution coming from the rest of the world. If all the industrial nations went down to zero emissions –- remember what I just said, all the industrial emissions went down to zero emissions -– it wouldn’t be enough, not when more than 65% of the world’s carbon pollution comes from the developing world.’
Then we have this
NYT 10 Dec: Secretary of State John Kerry took a similar tack in a speech here on Wednesday.
“For a moment — and a moment only — let’s give the climate deniers the benefit of the doubt,” he said. Even if the overwhelming scientific consensus is wrong, he asked rhetorically, “what is the worst that could happen” by shifting away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy?
The answer to his question in the second quote is easy —many economies will be wrecked.
The damn fools of the developed world brought this upon themselves. They started and promoted this BS and others are taking advantage. Idiot Kerry.
If anyone had any doubts, the purpose of COP21 is now out in the open.
“Pay up if you want my country to go along with your climate mitigation proposals.”
There may be a few developing countries where financial due diligence is practiced. But I don’t know any and I have been working in development since 1970. Whatever the source of funds, loans or grants, the leakage from the coffers of the state sector to the pockets of the political class is substantial. Depending on the country and the sector, the percentage stolen varies from zero to 100%.
International donors would consider a country well-run if the level of misappropriation averages 15%. Such a figure would be deemed tolerable. The impact on the elites in developing countries would be enormous because the political elites typically make up 1% or less of the population of these countries. They are inter-related by blood, marriage and business.
So if the US were to contribute $200 billion, $30 billion would go into the pockets of the families and cronies of the very people who attend COP21.
That is why I think the name of the skeptical movie was well chosen: because COP21 was a hustle not much different in principle from someone trying to sell the Brooklyn Bridge.
What a surprise !! It all comes down to M-O-N-E-Y ?!?
Steyn’s line applies:
“Give us your money or the planet gets it.”
Amazing how such a big problem can all be solved with money. IPCC… What a bunch of con artists, shysters and frauds. And you know it will be all us poor people who will have to cough up the billions.
All the gold from planet earth dancing with pin heads.
The whole thing is a charade. What a juvenile Kerry is! Meanwhile China just keeps on being China – using as much coal as it wants and needs.
China’s coal consumption feeds my fruit orchard. I say “Thank you”, China!
Soooo…the developed countries don’t want a climate deal if we have to pay our fair share…aaaaand, the developing countries don’t want a climate deal if they have to pay their fair share. Great, it sounds like we have an agreement then.
naggme
Don’t be so daft. Who is that wants to fool around with the plant food? Not China Not India Not the developing countries. Just the w**kers.
The “fair share” for “developed” countries (except in intelligence) should be ZERO.
Increased CO2 already contributes $1.5 Trillion annually in additional foodstuff production worldwide, alleviating a lot of famine we’d have without it.
What, the developing* countries don’t like to eat?
*developing: they’re becoming as devious as our so-called “developed” countries!
The TV portrays the C02 pollution as the smog in China choking everybody. What does general pollution have to do with C02? I have spent time in India and thank God I only stayed three days in Delhi, I thought I was going to die. But people! it was absolutely nothing to do with C02, it was Carbon Monoxide poisoning for God’s sake. Are people so dumb that they don’t know the difference?
Jim\heath
Yes that and smoke .I too have been right through India and also parts of China of (Shanghai mainly) and you are right – that fool Obama and the equally inane Kerry have a totally misguided agenda. Obama has always been linked to the Chicago Climate Exchange PLC. One wonders how he ever became US president.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB124001537515830975 How CO 2 became a Pollutant
India/Africa…the same. Particulate pollution from fires for cooking and heating fueled by wood and dung. Been there, got the “T”-shirt and can still “smell” it. And BTW, smell is one of the most basic functions of the human system, connected to the limbic part of the brain.
There is a very simple legal reason SeccState Kerry can’t allow the payments to the fund to be binding.
If in the final agreement the payments are binding on signatories, it becomes a treaty and President Obama would be forced to submit the signed agreement to the US Senate for ratification. As long as payments are merely guidelines or suggested donations Kerry can sign it and not call it a treaty.
Joel
It was never a goer anyway – all Kerry was doing was posturing – he would have been there sooner but was detained by a full length mirror.
Owen Paterson has an excellent piece in today’s printed UK Daily Telegraph. The title is;
“Why the Climate Change Act must be scrapped”.
As a lifelong Conservative voter who now always votes UKIP, I will never vote Conservative as long as Cameron is leader. I can never forgive him for all the poisonous climate change nonsense spouted by him. But Owen Paterson would certainly get my vote….
Chris
Cameron is without doubt a consummate ghastly fence-sitting, mealy-mouthed, do-nothing jerk but don’t for a second think he actually believes in CAGW. He isn’t THAT stupid. He will simply sit there forever imagining he’s cunningly playing everyone while dreaming of being a great statesman on the World stage. He truly is THE most nausea-making odious little man.
Absolutely. The sanctimonious swine is keeping all his election pledges and planning a big finale where he gives the UK that long overdue EU membership referendum before standing down because he believes 2 terms as PM is enough for anyone. How dare he.
We’re sort of on the same side. I am a lifelong non-Conservative voter. But like you, I now also always vote UKIP.
Rich.
What an “expected” surprise. Maybe the “Developed Clowns” at COP read the article by Ari Halperin between mouthfuls of caviar and steak as they prepared for their “tough” negotiations. Why do they not just tell it as it is – that the Developed countries have no historical responsibility for the current level of atmospheric CO2 and that much of the current level is down to the Developing countries buying into the Green scams – like Green diesel that pollutes more than gasoline from emissions of particulate carbon and NOx but has increased atmospheric CO2 through the burning of large areas of rain forest in S E Asia and S America to grow Palm Oil or bio-ethanol.