Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese Premier Li Keqiangon on Friday flagged the issue of the adverse effects of climate change as one of the greatest global challenges facing people in the 21st century, and said it needs to be addressed through international cooperation in the context of sustainable development.
Both leaders and their respective delegations recalled the agreement on Cooperation on Addressing Climate Change between the India and China signed in 2009 and the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the two countries on Cooperation on Green Technologies signed in 2010.
The leaderships of the two nations, through a joint statement, said that they have decided to further promote their bilateral partnership on climate change and enhance the role of this overall strategic cooperation partnership.
India and China emphasized that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol are the most appropriate framework for international cooperation for addressing climate change. They also reaffirmed the principles of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities and the call for leaderships of developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide finance, technology and capacity building support to the developing countries.
The two sides also said that they would work together to advance the multilateral negotiations to achieve a comprehensive, balanced, equitable and effective agreement under the UNFCCC in 2015, with a view to ensuring the full, effective and sustained implementation of the UNFCCC. They expressed their full support for the success of the UN Climate Conference to be held in Paris, France (Paris Conference) later this year.
Both India and China reaffirmed that the 2015 agreement shall be in full accordance with the principles, provisions and structure of the UNFCCC, in particular the principles of equity and common but
differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, reflecting different historical responsibilities, development stages and national circumstances between developed and developing countries.
The 2015 agreement shall address mitigation, adaptation, finance, technology development and transfer, capacity building and transparency of action and support in a comprehensive and balanced
manner.
The two sides stressed on equal importance and urgency of implementing the outcomes of the Bali Road Map in order to increase the pre-2020 ambition and build mutual trust amongst countries. They further urged the developed countries to raise their pre-2020 emission reduction targets and honour their commitment to provide 100bn US dollars per year by 2020 to developing countries.
As the two biggest developing countries, China and India stressed on the need to undertake ambitious actions domestically on combating climate change through plans, policies and measures on mitigation and adaptation despite the enormous scale of their challenges in terms of social and economic development and poverty eradication.
The two nations said that they are fully engaged in their domestic preparations for their respective intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) in the context of the 2015 agreement and will
communicate their INDCs as early as possible and well before the Paris Conference.
Both India and China said that they believed that their bilateral partnership on climate change is mutually beneficial and contributes to the global efforts to address Climate Change. They have also
decided to enhance high-level bilateral dialogue on domestic climate policies and multilateral negotiations and to further strengthen practical bilateral cooperation, including in areas of clean energy
technologies, energy conservation, energy efficiency, renewable energy, sustainable transportation including electronic vehicles, low-carbon urbanization and adaptation.
