Hard commitments sought for a phase two Kyoto treaty

Pilita Clark and Andrew England in Durban Countries betting the European Union will cave in and accept a weak global climate deal need to think again, the UK warned on December 7, as pressure grows on negotiators in the final days of the UN climate talks. "Contrary to what's being put about by some people, the EU is not about to agree" to a second phase of the Kyoto climate treaty without "hard, bankable" commitments from other large nations, said Chris Huhne, the UK climate secretary. If there were no decent offer from other countries, the EU would be forced to put forward a "graduated" response in return, he warned, in a significant toughening of the bloc's rhetoric. Mr Huhne's comments underline the increasingly difficult position the EU faces as the only big group willing to put a substantial offer on the table at the two-week Durban talks, which end tomorrow. The group says it will agree to a second round of Kyoto pledges when the first expire in 12 months' time only if other countries not bound by Kyoto, such as China and the US, agree to start negotiating a second, legally-binding global pact obliging all nations to share the burden of cutting carbon emissions. The bloc has long said it wants the second deal negotiated by 2015 but Connie Hedegaard, EU climate commissioner, signalled more flexibility yesterday, telling reporters this date was "not cut in stone". And as doubts grow about whether China will accept legal obligations to curb its emissions, even after 2020, and the US baulks at anything hinting of a treaty ahead of a presidential election year, speculation is mounting that the EU will buckle further. Three original members of the Kyoto club - Japan, Russia and Canada - have already said they will not agree to a second phase of the treaty, the world's only binding climate deal, which is further complicating negotiations. "There is definitely a spirit to find some sort of solution but we have to acknowledge there are real concerns, one senior delegate said. "There is no middle anymore, the red lines have passed, the EU is saying legally [binding]; the US is saying no legal; the Chinese are saying what about the ship-jumpers of Japan and Canada?" Failure in Durban would weigh heavily on the EU, which has a long history of championing bold climate policies, at home and abroad, and hosted the first of the latest round of UN climate talks in Berlin in 1995. It was one of the first groups to suggest in UN talks that emissions be curbed to ensure global temperatures do not exceed 2 degrees Celsius. Its domestic policy to cut its carbon emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels by 2020 is among the world's most ambitious. But its position has steadily become more complicated as its membership has grown from the original 15 countries that negotiated the 1997 Kyoto pact to its current 27. Some of its newer members, such as coal-dependent Poland, have shown less willingness to embrace the policies countries such as the UK and Denmark favour. The prospect of these divisions resurfacing at the Durban talks is also leading some countries to bet the bloc will cave in. Ms Hedegaard, a Dane, is jointly leading negotiations in Durban with Marcin Korolec, Poland's environment minister, because Poland currently holds the rotating EU presidency. One UK politician in Durban yesterday claimed the bloc would be doing better if Poland was not playing such an important role. "If the UK was in the chair, they would try to find an agreement," said Lord Prescott, a former Labour deputy prime minister who led EU negotiators at the 1997 Kyoto talks but who is not a member of the EU delegation in Durban. Mr Korolec brushed aside Lord Prescott's claims, insisting the EU ministers here were united in their determination to achieve a strong, legally binding deal. "I am leading my work here on the basis of a mandate adopted unanimously by the EU environment ministers," he said. "We are pushing with others with a very clear and strong position." A spokesman for Ms Hedegaard declined to comment. Veteran observers of UN climate talks are watching the EU closely to see if this cohesion is maintained, especially since its lack of unity was obvious in the fraught 2009 Copenhagen talks. "They are being more cohesive now," said Lord Stern, author of the eponymous UK climate review. "I hope very much that holds until the end of the week. That makes an agreement more likely."