UPDATE - UN climate change treaty set for ratification
Date: 12-Nov-01
Country: MOROCCO
Author: Gilles Trequesser
The deal, reached after tough bargaining at the end of a two-week U.N.-sponsored conference on climate change in Morocco, provides a detailed rulebook governing the complex treaty aimed at limiting humanity's negative impact on the Earth's climate.
"We have an agreement," British Environment Minister Michael Meacher told reporters in the early hours of Saturday, after marathon negotiations on the final day of the meeting.
"It's a remarkable day for the environment after four years of negotiations on Kyoto," he added.
The 1997 Kyoto Protocol commits developed countries to reducing emissions of the greenhouse gases that are blamed for global warming by trapping heat in the atmosphere, by an average of five percent from 1990 levels by 2012. The worst offender is carbon dioxide (CO2) produced from the fuel burned by industry.
"We're quite confident now that the (Kyoto) protocol is saved," said Olivier Deleuze, the European Union's chief delegate at the talks.
The pact seemed in jeopardy last March when, after four years of tortuous negotiations on its content, the United States, the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, pulled out of the agreement, saying it would hurt the U.S. economy.
RATIFICATION NEEDED
The 15-member EU has said it will ratify Kyoto by 2002, but the treaty must be ratified by at least 55 countries responsible for 55 percent of the world's 1990 CO2 emissions before it can come into force.
"I am sure all countries will ratify, except for the United States," said Deleuze, who is also Belgium's Energy Minister. "Those who don't ratify, that's for a political reason," he added.
The long-term aim of the treaty is to curb what U.N. scientists say is the artificial warming of the Earth's climate and its consequences: rising sea levels, melting ice caps, changing rainfall patterns, increased flooding and more frequent droughts.
After Washington's abrupt withdrawal, all eyes turned to Russia and Japan. Without them, the whole pact could collapse.
Negotiators were deadlocked for hours last week after four countries - Australia, Canada, Japan and Russia - quickly dubbed the "gang of four" by environmentalists, raised objections to five points.
These included binding mechanisms to meet the pact's pollution-cutting targets and complex rules on the extent to which countries can offset their emissions by counting carbon stored in trees and vegetation and by expanding forests and farmland.
Delegates said one "crunch issue" which persisted right to the end of the negotiations was Russia's demand to increase its recourse to these "carbon sinks".
Under an agreement reached at the last conference in Bonn in July, Russia was allowed to claim a maximum 17 million tonnes of carbon a year from these "sinks".
It said at the time that the figure had been wrongly calculated and it demanded an "allowance" of 33 million tonnes in Marrakesh. It was not immediately clear which figure had been agreed in the final talks.
(Additional reporting by Robin Pomeroy).
MOROCCO: UPDATE - UN climate change treaty set for ratification.
By Gilles Trequesser
MARRAKESH, Morocco - World environment and energy ministers reached agreement early on the weekend on the fine print of the landmark Kyoto pact to limit global warming, paving the way for its implementation next year, delegates said.
The deal, reached after tough bargaining at the end of a two-week U.N.-sponsored conference on climate change in Morocco, provides a detailed rulebook governing the complex treaty aimed at limiting humanity's negative impact on the Earth's climate.
"We have an agreement," British Environment Minister Michael Meacher told reporters in the early hours of Saturday, after marathon negotiations on the final day of the meeting.
"It's a remarkable day for the environment after four years of negotiations on Kyoto," he added.
The 1997 Kyoto Protocol commits developed countries to reducing emissions of the
