Disappointment at Copenhagen

Disappointment at Copenhagen
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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The US-brokered deal with four emerging economies, including India, on climate change that places no legally-binding emission cuts on developed countries ran into rough weather on Saturday with a majority of poor countries rejecting it, as it was one-sided.

The deal between the US and BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) bloc is apparently a gain for developing nations which are required under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol to take legally binding emission cuts.

The Protocol expires on 2012 and the 194-nation Conference of Parties (COP) of the United Nations here has apparently failed to get a word on its extension.

Indian negotiators -- Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh and Prime Minister's Special Envoy on Climate Shyam Saran -- themselves acknowledged the fact that the deal is not done until it is approved by the plenary. However, Ramesh claimed that it was "a good deal."
"Right now we have a document that says that we continue with negotiations on what to do about the future, including the Bali Action Plan and Kyoto Protocol," Saran said.

Angry delegates of many countries like Tuvalu, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Venezuela and Cuba slammed the US-BASIC deal for showing them great "disrespect" by leaving them out of the drafting process and imposing their document on vast majority.

Cuban delegates said that US President Barack Obama, who brokered the US-BASIC deal, was "behaving like an emperor" and claimed that the draft was a "gross violation principle of sovereign equality."

Sudanese delegate Lumumba Di-Aping compared the deal to the "Holocaust." "This document cannot be accepted for adoption by the parties present here," said delegates from Costa Rica, adding that there was an absence of a legally-binding treaty.

The final draft contains elements like a limit of 2 degrees in temperature rise on the basis of equity, peaking of global and national emissions as soon as possible, factoring in overriding priorities of poverty for developing nations. It calls on Annex I parties or industrialised nations to set their emission targets by February 2010 and also asks the developing countries to do the same.

In the contentious area of Monitoring, Verification and Reporting (MVR), it provides that unsupported actions could be subject to assessment only by domestic institutions but adds a new provision for international consultations and analysis without impinging on national sovereignty.

On the finance side, it provides USD 100 billion for long-term funding for developing countries and USD 30 billion for short-term, which would go to the poorest and most vulnerable.

The Chinese Premier (Wen Jiabao) took the lead in finding a compromise, and our Prime Minister (Manmohan Singh), President Lula (Da Silva of Brazil) and President (Jacob) Zuma (of South Africa) also participated," Ramesh said.

The four leaders, after holding their own discussions, approached Obama, who was not only negotiating on behalf of the US but was also acting as a mediator between Europe and the BASIC, he said. "Whatever the deal India has got is on behalf of the four (BASIC) countries."
However, Ramesh said they had a draft Copenhagen outcome which had been substantially approved by "this smaller group" .He said "Now this goes to the plenary, the plenary has to approve. There are still some differences of opinion. China and Small Island States are battling it out." During the 60-minute meeting between Obama and BASIC leaders, the US President was very appreciative of the unilateral measures India was taking.

Ramesh mentioned about Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statment that there was no question of making our unilateral commitments internationally legally binding;we will reflect them in an international agreement in a suitable way but we are not going to take any internationally legally binding commitments. That is simply not on the cards. he added that Obama had appreciated Singh's statement.

During the meeting, the Minister said, "unfortunately" British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy did not seem appreciative of India's point of view.

"At a couple of moments, there were sharp exchanges between me and President Sarkozy," Brown told a TV channel, adding the Indian side also had some problem with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. However after the meeting these leaders Brown said that they have respect for Singh and knew what a "great Prime Minister he is and what good job India is doing."

Greenpeace UK’s executive director John Sauven said: “There are no targets for carbon cuts and no agreement on a legally binding treaty. It seems there are too few politicians in this world capable of looking beyond the horizon of their own narrow self-interest.”
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At Copenhagen: can Obama win another Nobel ?

At Copenhagen: can Obama win another Nobel ?
(Madan menon Thottasseri)
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Negotiators facing a Friday deadline hammered out an initial draft UN climate pact overnight that calls for a two degree Celsius cap on global temperatures and billions in aid for poor nations, sources said.

US President Barack Obama will join more than 120 other world leaders on the final day of the climate talks, designed to strike a deal to boost international efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions widely blamed for heating up the planet.

The draft still under discussion proposed limiting a rise in global average temperatures to within two degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels, the sources, who declined to be identified, said.
Small islands, called as low-lying countries worried about rising seas want a tougher target of 1.5 degrees. Temperatures have already risen half that level over the past century, the UN climate panel says.

Two sources said the draft pledged rich countries to donate $100 billion annually by 2020 to poor nations to help them adapt their economies and cope with climate change that threatens to bring chaotic weather.

Leaders from 26 rich and developing countries met into the early hours of Friday to try and overcome deep divisions that have plagued the negotiations since they were launched two years ago in Bali, Indonesia..

The draft agreement which may get changed did not currently mention carbon emissions reduction targets for industrialized nations, one source said. The two-week talks in Copenhagen have struggled to overcome deep differences over rich nations' targets to cut emissions, mostly from burning fossil fuels, climate funds and action by big developing countries to curb carbon pollution.

A major issue for rich nations will be of pressurizing China and India, the world's top and fourth-largest carbon emitters, to compromise and agree for outside scrutiny of pledged steps to curb their emissions.

Rasmussen hopes the leaders' meeting will yield a draft document that all 193 nations attending the UN talks could agree will form the basis of an eventual legally binding climate deal to expand or replace the existing Kyoto Protocol. The United Nations hopes this will be sealed next year.
Kyoto's first phase ends in 2012 and a key focus of the talks is finding a formula that captures stronger action by the United States, other rich nations and big developing countries to avoid dangerous climate change.

The United States never ratified Kyoto.

Obama is due to arrive on Friday and is expected to face pressure to pledge deeper emissions cuts. The United States is the world's number two emitter of greenhouse gases.
He is expected to meet Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on the sidelines of the talks, the largest ever climate summit.

Officials said the United States was making progress with China on outstanding issues but could not say whether a deal would result after Obama arrived.
One US official said there was progress on monitoring, reporting and verification requirements by China and other big developing countries on their emissions curbs. China has resisted such requirements.

The United States had helped the mood at the talks on Thursday by promising to back a $100 billion a year fund for poor nations from 2020. Such funds would be more than all current aid flows to poor nations, a UN official said, and in line with demands put forward for African nations. "That's very encouraging," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said of the US pledge.

Accord on finance is one part of a puzzle that also includes a host of other measures, such as saving rainforests, boosting carbon markets and stiffening global carbon emissions curbs. But any deal will have to be agreed by unanimity. Some small island states and African nations - most vulnerable to climate change - say they will not agree a weak deal.

"We are moving out of the valley of death. We are beginning to see the outlines of a compromise, helped by the US offer on finance," said Kim Carstensen, head of the WWF environmental group's global climate initiative.

When the Secretary of State – Hillary Clinton repeated the U.S. would cut emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, China reacted by confirming that its voluntary emissions target was nonnegotiable. China announced last month it would cut its “carbon intensity,” or the amount of emissions in relation to production, by 40 to 45 percent.

The European Union said Thursday that it will not raise its 20 percent cuts to 30 percent, as it has offered, unless it sees more ambitious actions from other countries, especially China.

The money announced by Clinton, to help poorer nations cope with climate change and develop clean—energy sources, was not guaranteed. The secretary of state said the U.S. agreement to an annual transfer of $100 billion in richer nations’ public and private funds to developing countries was contingent on reaching a broader agreement that covers the “transparency” of China’s measures to limit heat-trapping gases.

Chinese Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei told reporters Beijing had no legal obligation to verify its emissions actions, but was not afraid of supervision or responsibility.

“We will enhance and improve our national communication” to the U.N. on emissions, He said. The Chinese official indicated his country’s emissions-cutting actions would then be open to international scrutiny, saying China was willing to provide explanations and clarifications on its reports. Laureate

“The purpose is to improve transparency,” He said, adding that Beijing was ready to take part in “dialogue and cooperation that is not intrusive and doesn’t infringe on China’s sovereignty.”

Still the world is looking at the Nobel Winner to wrest some credible success from the negotiating process. And on Thursday, with almost 120 heads of state and government already in attendance, there were some signs that a meaningful political deal might be at hand, including a slight shift in China’s position and a pledge by the United States to help the poorest nations cope financially with global warming.

Top negotiators suspect that could prove a humiliating failure, because China and the United States, the world’s two largest emitters, remain deeply divided over a number of difficult problems. China, the world’s largest producer of greenhouse gases, has brought the talks to a virtual standstill all week over this issue, which its leaders claim to be an affront to national sovereignty.

But the Chinese balkiness on the issue is matched in large measure by Obama’s own constraints. The Senate has not yet acted on a climate bill that the president needs to make good on his promises of emissions reductions and on the financial support that he has now promised the rest of the world.Many U.S experts believe that if the Chinese will not accept monitoring of emissions, then a deal is not worth doing.”

Obama is putting a measure of his and the nation’s prestige on the line by entering a debate with so much still unresolved. It was only 11 weeks ago that he left this same city empty-handed after pleading for Chicago to be selected as the site of the 2016 Olympics!

But the manipulation and brinksmanship that have characterized the final week of the talks is also a sign of their seriousness; never before have global leaders come so close to a meaningful agreement to reduce the greenhouse gases linked to warming the planet.

A Promise worth $100 : Will India and China fall prey?

A Promise worth $100 : Will India and China fall prey?
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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World leaders were racing against time to hammer out a deal to combat global warming, Still, a confident India represented by jairam Ramesh interacted with US and other key negotiators in an attempt to reach a "coordinated" position prior to the table at the final meeting.

Ramesh remarked that Todd Stern representing U.S had expressed a desired support for some of the elements but could not agree for other elements that was put forth to them,. He said that India is continuing to work out a coordinated position. In fact India and the US held discussions on the contentious issue of monitoring, review and verification (MRV) and made some progress but there was no major breakthrough.

According to Ramesh Seventy five per cent of the formula has been accepted. The remaining 25 per cent originates to the review mechanism issue wherein India had given the understanding that only informations can be provided and no inspection by outside agencies are not agreeable. US has been pushing up for a consultative mechanism , unacceptable to India and China as well.

Of course Ramesh had welcomed the US secretary of state, Ms Hillary Clinton’s announcement of American contribution to a $100 billion climate cleanup fund.

Earlier on Thursday Denmark seemed to have given up efforts to push a text for the meeting that was strongly resisted by India, China and the G-77 nations. Just a day before the closure of the climate change summit, its fate still hangs in balance as heads of state and government in Denmark began hectic parleys to approve an agreed document which has so far proved elusive. Now it would be up to the leaders of the US, China, India and other G-77 nations to forge a last-minute agreement.

Denmark was said to be working on a “political agreement” text that would postpone the decisions on the Kyoto Protocol and the long-term cooperative action to next year. British PM Gordon Brown was also said to be bringing together negotiators for an agreed text.
After the meeting, Ramesh said that he had told the Americans- "You should be transparent about the word transparency."

The U.N. climate talks ran into serious problems Friday morning as negotiators tried to forge a political agreement for the summit meeting of President Barack Obama, China’s premier and more than 110 other world leaders.

Delegates spoke of continuing disputes behind closed doors between developed and developing countries, the divide that has dogged the two-week U.N. climate conference from the beginning.
Swedish Environment Minister Andreas Carlgren said that no agreed text had emerged just an hour before the presidents and premiers were to gather at a Copenhagen convention hall.

With negotiations reaching a final stage at the climate change meet, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh arrived here last night to lead the Indian delegation at the crucial talks.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao on Friday held talks in a bid to consolidate the position of developing countries ahead of the world leaders' meeting in Copenhagen.

In his opening remarks during his meeting with Wen, Singh recalled that the two countries have been cooperating at various front including the G-20.

"We need to continue the cooperation," said the Prime Minister, who arrived in the Danish capital late last night to take part in the high-level segment of the 12-day UN climate talks.

Besides Singh and Wen, US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicholas Sarkozy are among the 110 world leaders who would attend the 15th Conference of Parties (COP) on its final day today.

The developing countries have been resisting attempts by the rich nations to set aside the Kyoto Protocol, which sets legally binding greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets for industrialized nations. The 1997 protocol also has a strong compliance mechanism which penalises the rich nations if they do not meet emission reduction targets agreed upon by them.
Prime Minister man Mohan Singh arrived at Copenhagen at a time when the consensus is getting eluded. He landed there with a message to preserve the areas of consensus on mitigation actions and finances and transfers of green technologies to developing countries enshrined in the Bali Action Plan.

Prior to the meeting of over 110 world leaders at the climate change conference, Singh is scheduled to meet with his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao in a bid to consolidate position of the developing countries for the plenary.

"The UNFCCC and its Kyoto Protocol embody the international agreed regime for addressing the global challenge of climate change," the Prime Minister had given a press statement before flying from New Delhi.

The 12-day 15th Conference of Parties, which concludes here on Friday, is expected to issue a short communique on the need and urgency to arrest climate change instead of a political statement which could form a basis that could be the basis of a legally-binding agreement in the future.

The rich nations are expected to make a Strong pitch for limiting the global temperature rise to two degrees Celsius, agreeing to achieve 80 per cent emission cuts by 2050 and prompt e developing countries to undertake strong mitigation actions which would see a significant deviation from the business as usual approach.

However, the above points do not mention a base year for from which the emission reductions would be undertaken but stresses on transparent verification actions for all the parties.
As mentioned earlier, the group of four comprising Brazil, South Africa, India and China (BASIC) cannot compromise and will strongly oppose this proposal contending that it makes no reference to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Bali Action Plan and the Kyoto Protocol.

Despite certain nations not ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, the Bali Action Plan of 2007 and the UNFCCC were adopted by consensus. It wants nations which have not ratified Kyoto to take commitments comparable to those agreed to it.

The Prime Minister is there just to reiterate the Indian stand and apply pressure by thrusting this point for insisting that it is of prime importance to preserve the areas of consensus and agree to continue negotiations based on the Bali Action Plan and the UNFCCC.
India and other developing countries have been insisting that neither would they take up legally binding emission cuts, nor accept a year by which their emissions would peak.

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Still Violence Outside……. When All Failed Inside

Still Violence Outside……. When All Failed Inside
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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There were violence on Wednesday December 16, 2009 also ouside the Bella center. Protestors marched from the Railway Station just a mile away to made their way to the summit venue where representatives from nearly 200 countries are meeting to try to reach an accord on climate Change.Police officers used pepper spray and wielded batons and finally arrested 250 people for violence.

Police dispersed the chanting, drum-beating protesters and few delegates came out ot interact with tem. They were not permitted for the same.

In the meantime, the Danish chairwoman of the conference, Connie Hedegaard, said that she is stepping down and that the Danish Prime Minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, would take her place as heads of state from around the world are arriving in Copenhagen. Hedegaard, a conservative, Denmark’s Minister of climate and energy and her stepping down is be seen as an attempt to shift the global environmental issues from the periphery into the political mainstream.

On Wednesday’s demonstrations, protesters began massing north of the center shortly before noon and pressed into a tight line of riot police blocking access to the hall. Some of the officers wielded truncheons against the chanting, shoving protesters in a close-order scrum. After forcibly removing protesters from a truck parked in an intersection outside the Bella Center, police in blue vans kept moving the protesters backwards, nearly pushing some into a watery marsh.

When Police advanced ,a scuffle broke out with protesters who formed human chains and chanted their commitment to nonviolence so as to people in all parts of the world who will be hardest hit by climate change. A number of protesters encouraged individual groups to keep pushing against the police.

Police deployed water cannon at the southeast corner of the center to push back the marchers if necessary. Climate Justice Action, a Danish umbrella group that has served as the organizing agent for a number of planned and spontaneous demonstrations during the conference, has a permit to march along a specified route south of the venue.

According to one organizer, Anne Petermann, the overarching message of Wednesday’s action is that the U.N process for curbing climate change is a failure, and that there are “thousands of other solutions to climate change that aren’t being considered,” she said.

Another member of the protest group, Richard Bernard, said he expected arrests and possible clashes with policeand said “Danish police have been violating human rights all week.”

Authorities were restricting access to the rail station serving the Bella Center, forcing many conference attendees to walk a mile or more in cold drizzle and biting winds.

Groups of delegates and members of nongovernmental organizations continued to stream on foot past subway stations that had been closed to prevent demonstrators from converging. They passed groups of detained protesters seated in neat rows, their hands tied with plastic police strips. Behind a department store, about a dozen detained protesters under police guard chanted anti-capitalist slogans.

Inside the center, the British P.M Gorden Brown and Australian P.M Kevin Rudd arrived ahead of other world leaders to begin what was expected to be an intense day of discussions to untangle some of the many issues standing in the way of a global agreement.

Negotiators debated until just before dawn without setting new goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions or for financing poorer countries’ efforts to cope with coming climate change, key elements of any deal, The Associated Press reported.

“In these very hours, we are balancing between success and failure,” Hedegaard told delegates Tuesday night before she stepped down. “Success is still within reach. But I must also warn you: we can fail.”

Much of the focus on Wednesday was expected to be on the financing arrangements of the deal, under which industrialized nations would transfer billions of dollars annually to poor nations to help them cope with a changing climate.

One of the proposals to be discussed Wednesday was put forward by Meles the prime minister of Ethiopia, who has been in talks with Goden Brown, Obama and other leaders. The amount and timing of payments were still under discussion.

Norway and Mexico have also offered a financing plan, which envisions annual payments to developing countries substantially higher than the $10 billion annual figure that Mr. Obama said the United States would support in the near term.

Developing countries have said that they will need $100 billion to $200 billion a year by 2020 to pay for low-carbon energy development and adaptation to global warming changes.
Outside the hall, police searched the bags of potential protesters and watched warily as crowds began to gather at rail stops within walking distance of the Bella Center.

Mette Hermansen, 27,a Teacher Trainee and a member of the International Socialists of Denmark, said, “In the Bella Center they are not discussing solutions to climate change. They are discussing how rich countries can continue emitting and how to sell that to the public. We are not preventing leaders from making solutions but encouraging them to make solutions.”

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Count Down…. Less than 48 hours and still no progress at Summit

Count Down…. Less than 48 hours and still no progress at Summit
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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With a little over 48-hours left of the two-week Copenhagen climate change conference, there has been no significant progress on any of the major issues.

There are no numbers from individual countries on how much each would be willing to contribute to a global climate protection fund. Nor has any country improved on its opening offer for cutting emissions.

Most developing countries, led by China, are still refusing to commit to legally binding actions to reduce the rate of growth of their emissions. They are clinging to the ten-year-old Kyoto Protocol, which allows them to carry on increasing their emissions indefinitely.

There is no certainty that any of the pledges made to date will be fulfilled because the 193 countries cannot agree on a consistent, independent monitoring system.

Even assuming all the commitments to emissions reductions were implemented, global emissions of CO2 equivalent would still be five billion tonnes, or 11 per cent, higher than they need to be in 2020 to have a 50/50 chance of the average temperature increase remaining below 2C.
It is still possible that the arrival of 115 heads of state today and tomorrow will force a breakthrough. Many, like Gordon Brown, are counting on returning to their countries on Friday night or Saturday morning with a piece of paper to wave at voters to convince them they have secured a planet-saving deal.

Everyone is waiting to see if President Obama will improve the offer from the US when he joins the conference on Friday. There is a widespread reluctance among other countries to make significant concessions until the country which has caused most of the problem takes more of its fair share of the burden of solving it.

Yet the British Government is publicly defending Mr Obama’s weak offer because it has decided it is the best the world is likely to get, given the degree of opposition in the US Congress to making any sacrifices or spending any significant sums to tackle emissions.

The only concrete agreement to emerge on Friday may be a deal on halting the destruction of the world’s rainforests by 2030. Everyone here seems to agree that the rainforests are worth saving and that people in rich countries must pay to protect them by making the trees more valuable alive than dead for their owners. The negotiators seem to find it easier agreeing on something tangible like trees rather than something invisible like CO2.

The communiqué signed by the leaders on Friday will confirm the intention of capping the temperature increase at 2C but the details of how to achieve that will be left to future negotiations. Ed Miliband, the Energy and Climate Secretary, said that he wants the intentions expressed on Friday to be turned into a legally binding treaty within six months. That timescale is likely to prove wildly optimistic.

Many world leaders are leaving for Copenhagen . Of course Prime Minister Man Mohan Sign too leaves for the capital of Denmark just to witness the disappointing threats while the close of the summit of 12 days!P.M will be there on Thursday and Friday, ie. December 17 and 18, 2009.Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao had epressed that the Danish chairmanship seemed to be working for a political agreement and not a legally binding traty that would cover the immediate and strong action in areas covered by Bali summit in 2007 so as to achieve a comprehensive legal framework during 2010.

The key objective of India and its coalition partners have to ensure that any further work in the post-Copenhagen phase of negotiations has to be proceeded on the basis of the principles and provisions of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Bali Action Plan.

Obviously we have wait for the next summit at Mexico in second half of 2010.
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Two Climate Drafts

Two Climate Drafts
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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Connie Hedegaard, the Danish President of the Climate summit who is stepping down enabling Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen declared on two drafts, on the Kyoto Protocol and Long Term Cooperative Action (LCA) tracks of negotiation triggered uproar, stunned many delegates with indignant demands of of 'inclusivity' and 'transparency'.

India’s Vijai Sharma expressed unhappiness as the move was against the essence of multilateralism.

In the plenary session there was confusion while discussing the Kyoto Protocol tough many areas are still heavily-bracketed , ie.unresolved while is presented for conclusion to the respective ministers.

When Hedegaard announced about the preparation of "two texts" -- one on Kyoto Protocol - and another on the Long Term Cooperative Action (LCA), all delegates were at their wits end!
There was a visibly dividing response in the session.Despite the shocking expression against the unprecedented move by China and India, developed nations including Australia, the EU and the U.S have Stated that the G77 and China were responsible for the situation as they have spoiled negotiations.

For 10 days now negotiators from 192 countries, who were later joined by their ministers, have been struggling to hammer out a climate deal to combat global warming.
The overall climate negotiations are moving under two tracks - the LCA under the Bali Action Plan that requires parties to produce a legally-binding treaty before the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012.

The second track is the extension of the Kyoto Protocol into the second commitment period from 2013 to 2018 where developed countries listed under Annex B will have to take binding cuts.

The essence of Bali plans are as follows:

For developed countries such as the United States, the result of the exercise was supposed to be "Measurable, reportable and verifiable nationally appropriate mitigation commitments or actions, including quantified emission limitation and reduction objectives, by all developed country Parties, while ensuring the comparability of efforts among them, taking into account differences in their national circumstances."

For developing countries such as China, India and Brazil, the negotiating objective was "Nationally appropriate mitigation actions by developing country Parties in the context of sustainable development, supported and enabled by technology, financing and capacity-building, in a measurable, reportable and verifiable manner."

It is to be noted that when the agreement was inked, the Bush administration had made it clear that it did not think this language would preclude binding emission cuts for major emerging economies. But countries like China and India made it clear then itself that they think it does, and their officials have to refer back to the Bali Action Plan any time they're asked to commit to mandatory cuts.
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Australian Recipe for Disaster at Copenhagen

Australian Recipe for Disaster at Copenhagen
(Madan Menon Thottasseri)
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Lumumba Di-Aping , chief negotiator for 'G77 and China' had a reason to accuse Australian Premier Kevin Rudd of misleading his people of his position on climate change.

Lumumba Di-Aping, said that he had high expectations of Rudd, but throughout negotiations Australia has not matched its actions with its rhetoric. "The message Kevin Rudd is giving to his people, his citizens, is a fabrication, it's fiction," he said.

"All that Australia has done so far is simply not good enough. It's puzzling in the sense that here is a Prime Minister who actually won the elections because of his commitment to climate change," he added.

Rudd was the only Prime Minister who came and clearly said "we have to do something, we have to join Kyoto protocol and all the rest". And within a very short period of time he changed his mind,position and started acting as if he has been converted into climate change skepticism.
Di-Aping accused Rudd of trying to gain a strategic economic advantage by siding with the United States and the European Union at Copenhagen.

Di Aping commented "Australia is committed to killing Kyoto,"

Rudd told a news conference in Copenhagen that his aim at the climate change talks is to get the best possible agreement in Australia's national interest.

Very serious differences had emerged out between India and Australia over the direction of talks at the climate summit here while Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh lashed out at Canberra, by dubbing it as an "ayatollah" for its one-way approach.

"Australia is sort of the ayatollah of the single track," That was the quoting by Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh , even reported in Australia’s 'Sydney Morning Herald'.

Developing countries are arguing that Australia and its allies are trying to push the outcome of talks away from the Kyoto Protocol, and Ramesh called it "a recipe for disaster". Ramesh, who cancelled a meeting with Australia's Climate Change Minister Penny Wong aimed at breaking the deadlock on Tuesday, told the daily that he had not "pulled out... as he was unfortunately too busy" to hold the meet. "Penny Wong remains a good friend of mine, a very valued colleague," he said.

Wong said: "You will have to ask him," when asked why the meeting was cancelled.
Ramesh also said he would not be cooperating in a session with her to try to break the deadlock even after a request from the Danish head of the UN conference Connie Hedegaard.

Wong said that it was regrettable that there are some who are willing to fight about process rather than to negotiate on the substance when what is asked of them required so much more.
With Australia and its allies coming under intense attack over claims that they want to "kill" the Kyoto Protocol, Wong attempted to offer lukewarm support for it.

But her rhetoric skills still continue- "I wanted to make very clear there is a lot in the Kyoto Protocol which is good... We need to do what is in the Kyoto Protocol and we need to go further".
If this is diplomacy and negotiation, will Copenhagen reach an accord? Answer is known to all….