CSE flays rich nations on emission cuts

Environment activist Sunita Narain today said that India and China should not agree to mandatory emission cuts of 80 per cent by 2050 in the ongoing UN-led climate talks at Bali which began on Monday.

She said the rich countries had no right to demand this from the developing countries especially when they have failed to make the 5 per cent cuts in CO2 emissions they had agreed to make under the Kyoto Protocol since 1991.

She said instead of cutting emissions the rich countries have increased emissions by 11 per cent and are still blaming India and China for the world's climate problems.

"Whether they cut their emissions or not, developing countries will not take injustice in this matter. We will go to hell with the US for this," she said at a press conference today.

The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), headed by Narain, was non-committal on the position taken by the Government of India that per capita emissions of countries should not be taken into account while calculating the emission caps.

Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia recently expressed differences with the UNDP over its projections of major CO2 emittors showing India as the fourth largest in the world.

He had said that the projections were arbitrary and the demand for cuts in emissions were based on the per capita emissions of each nation and that was unfair.

She said broadly the CSE was on the same side of the government on climate and dismissed the matter of per capita emissions versus average national emissions as a matter of detail. She, however, admitted that the CSE had always gone by per capita emissions.

Narain added that the key issue was that the politics of climate change was stinking and rich countries were getting away with not only all the CO2 emissions made in the past but also with the emissions they are continuing to make and are targeting India and China as the potential villains in the climate war.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had this year in its report documented the increase in emissions in some of the richest countries.

Between 1990 and 2005, when the Kyoto Protocol had been in existence, Australia's CO2 emissions increased by 37 per cent, and that of Canada and the US by 27 and 20 per cent respectively.

While emissions from the growth-related energy sector increased by 15 per cent, within the energy sector, energy-related industry emissions increased by 24 per cent and transport by 28 per cent.