India organised a little shindig for the last couple of days with like minded developing countries (called LMDCs), like China, and announced they did not want any obligatory stuff from the UN about cutting carbon emissions.
I quite like the Indian environment minister’s way of phrasing it:
“All countries have decided to take action, but that action is voluntary and nationally determined, not internationally determined,” India’s environment and forests minister Prakash Javadekar said addressing the negotiators this afternoon.
“Paris can become a festival if the world accepts this scenario – all countries take action, whatever is possible with their resources,” Javadekar said.
“If we welcome everybody’s nationally-determined actions, without criticising each other and without entering into a blame game, Paris will be successful.”
But they do want more money:
The LMDCs have also asked the developed countries to provide “additional, predictable, and sustainable climate finance” to help developing countries enhance their climate actions to cover the period up to 2020 and beyond.
I think this translates to: We’re very committed. We’ll do a lot. Don’t check up on us, just pay us.
Spot the UN double speak
The plain speaking Indian Environment minister rather sees through the UN gambit on “storms”:
Javadekar expressed his unhappiness with what he said was “double-speak” by the developed countries.
“In loss and damage, there is double speak,” he said. “When a hurricane happens, they see the gravity of climate change, when some country asks for loss and damage on that account, they come out with the logic that one has to prove whether it is climate change event or a natural event – when compensation is to be paid, it is a natural event, when there is no claim then it becomes a climate change event.”
Storms are really income-generating-UN-events. Which storms are man-made: the ones that increase the UN bank accounts.