 "Laurent Fabius, Francois Hollande, Ban Ki-moon")
India's Environment, Forests and Climate Change Minister Prakash Javadekar welcomed the final version of the Paris climate change package, saying that the text seemed to reflect all the concerns of the developing country.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on Saturday presented the global climate accord, a landmark measure to transform the global fossil fuel-driven economy within decades and turn the tide on global warming.
In a win for a broad coalition of "ambitious" nations, the agreement would set a tougher goal for limiting the rise in global temperatures to "well below" two degrees Celsius.
Nations would have to reach a peak in greenhouse emissions "as soon as possible" and achieve a balance between output of manmade greenhouse gases and absorption - by forests or the oceans - "by the second half of this century".
It also requires rich nations to maintain a $100 billion a year funding pledge beyond 2020, and use that figure as a "floor" for further support agreed by 2025, providing greater financial security to developing nations as they wean themselves away from coal-fired power.
Setting a broad goal of eliminating the net increase in man-made greenhouse gas emission this century, the agreement does not mandate specific measures or targets. Instead, it creates a system for ensuring countries make good on voluntary domestic efforts to curb emissions, and provides billions more dollars to help poor nations cope with the transition to a greener economy.
Countries began meeting in groups to review where they stood and how happy they were with their point of views being reflected in the accord.
India's internal assessment showed some concerns on how the differentiation had been implemented across various streams of the agreement with weakness particularly evident in the section requiring countries to report their actions. Javadekar said he would express some of the concerns in the meetings to be held soon.
Sources said the US, too, had some reservations with the agreement and were likely to approach the French presidency with these.
The Paris package comprises of two sets of documents that the nations would adopt - or not - later in the evening. The first is called the Paris Agreement; the other is a decision that the Conference of Parties would also adopt to operationalise details of the agreement. At the moment, technically, the agreement is an annexure to the decision that the countries will adopt. If they do so, the agreement will become a live document.
Some of the contentious issues that developed countries or others did not want reflected in the durable agreement were shifted down to the decision which is legally less onerous. But experts noted that the agreement itself did not provide for any punitive action for countries not meeting their obligations so the two documents held the same weightage in practical terms.
The agreement also does not provide the option for countries to put reservations to any part of the agreement while accepting the rest. This lack of space for countries to dissent, a gamble by the French, many said could pay off considering their strong diplomatic endeavour through the last few months to secure a success.
India, too, internally contended with the question of whether or not it was possible at this late stage to save itself from some of the mine-fields the agreement and the decisions promised to open in future. Like in all multilateral agreement, creative ambiguity - using language that leaves the meaning of phrases and sentences open-ended for countries to interpret the way they like - seemed to be the hope that on Saturday evening the countries would pass the Paris package. For example, the agreement itself did not say that it was being signed under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change or that it would follow the provisions of the convention. But it said it would follow the principles of the convention while enhancing the implementation of the agreement. The decision to be taken by the COP on the other hand mentioned that the agreement was under the convention.
While for many countries negotiating here the eyes have been set at the main agreement, the decision to be adopted itself has not got so much attention and not been negotiated in as much detail. The ambiguities in the decisions and how they would impact the working of the agreement, bothered India internally but it was not clear if the environment minister Javadekar was willing at this stage to take them up.
Before presenting the two final documents the French foreign minister and President had made moving speeches to wide acclaim by those gathered. But that clapping had soon faded as countries began reading for the fine print. Yet, delegates noted that the pressure at the final meeting, called the plenary, would be too high, to raise concerns unless countries had serious problems with the contents.
The French tried to resolve the big fight over climate finance by lobbing it in to the decision asking developing countries to provide more finance in the post-2020 era using US $100 billion as a benchmark.
As per the US demands an explicit reference to foregoing any compensation or filing liability claims against developed countries was provided in the decision text.
Overall the agreement had moved substantially away from the original convention. In the convention the actions of developing world are enabled by the provision of finance and technology. In the final version of the Paris package, the trigger had been weakened. Countries would get to do what they want to reduce emissions and they would get financial support that the developed countries give. But, the latter would not be held deeply accountable for how much they had provided. For India, on preliminary reading, in several parts it had been able to retain some space for future economic growth but there was little at the moment in the package to suggest countries would substantially ramp up action in coming years or that developed countries would continue to take the lead in doing so.
In a win for a broad coalition of "ambitious" nations, the agreement would set a tougher goal for limiting the rise in global temperatures to "well below" 2 degrees Celsius.
A negotiator from the Like-Minded Developing Countries of which India and China are part said that on preliminary read their Super red-lines or issues on which they were absolutely not willing to compromise seemed to have been protected. At the time of writing this report the countries were yet to meet collectively to gavel the decision and the agreement through by complete consensus. But the French diplomacy so far had ensured that this was the closest these 196 countries have ever come to hammer together a new agreement ever since the original climate convention was approved in 1992.
VIEWPOINTS
Industry and environment bodies reacted to the Paris climate change accord, even as the negotiators studied it before approval:
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"The deal does not force countries to cut emissions fast enough. This will only ramp up adaptation costs in the future"
Helen Szoke, executive director, Oxfam International
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"Much of the text [of the draft] has been diluted, but the new imperative to limit temperature rises to 1.5 degrees and the new goal of net-zero emissions by the second half of this century is commendable"
Greenpeace India
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"Developed nations now must take measures to combat the ill effects of development. But they are making developing nations like India take prohibitive measures. This will adversely affect our changes of growth"
