A climate change conference. Then another. Then another. And, then, a fourth.
Just when articles and editorials parsing the fallout of the Copenhagen climate conference neared zero, a new round of international negotiations is now underway with not one, not two, but four international meetings on climate change occurring in April.
This past week, the UNFCCC held is first post-Copenhagen meeting in Bonn, Germany. NRDC’s Jack Schmidt, blogging from the conference, says that talks pivoted around two issues. 1) Process — whether or not international negotiations continue within the consensus-based UNFCCC process or within a smaller stakeholders group of nations and — how to integrate the Copenhagen Accord, which emerged from negotiations between the U.S., China, Brazil, South Africa, and India, among others, during the waning hours of the Copenhagen talks. 2) Expectations – Several countries – primarily the U.S. – are pursuing an “all or nothing” approach, seeking a comprehensive climate agreement whereby nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. Other countries and many NGOs are interested in implementing agreements on, say, deforestation efforts or adaptation and mitigation financing in the absence of a comprehensive agreement.
Bolivia’s UN ambassador released a statement celebrating developing countries success in blocking the U.S.’s insistence on establishing the Copenhagen Accord as the basis for forward negotiations. Alliance of Small Island States Chair Dessima Williams praised the “resuscitation of a positive spirit” during the negotiations. But the divisions between rich and poor countries and the disagreements over how to negotiate a climate agreement remain – little seems to have changed since December.
While the pushback against the Copenhagen Accord and unity among several developing and low-lying nations against the U.S. was certainly a victory, it might be a short-lived one. The Washington Post reported that the U.S. was withholding climate funds from two countries opposing the Copenhagen Accord and the Guardian revealed that U.S. strategy in the months leading up to the next UNFCCC meeting in Cancun later this year will be one of no compromise.
The Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate, a grouping established by Obama in March 2009 and including the world’s 17 leading economic entities, convenes April 18 – 19. U.S. climate negotiator Todd Stern will chair the proceedings, pushing hard for jettisoning the Kyoto Agreement and for the Copenhagen Accord becoming the basis for future climate talks. The U.S. will also use this conference as a moment to advocate for small group negotiations rather than within the 192 member UNFCCC process. Think of it as part two of the side negotiations the U.S. undertook during the Copenhagen talks and which resulted in the Copenhagen Accord.
As the U.S.-led MEF talks wind down, the Bolivian government-sponsored People’s Conference on Climate Change will get underway in Cochabamba on April 19th, running through the 22nd. The conference brings together representatives from nation-states and international climate and economic justice movements and indigenous rights organizations. I can’t think of a moment in recent history when there’s been this degree of cooperative work between nation-states and social movements. The New Left of the ‘60s shunned the state, as did the anti-capitalist globalization movements more recently. This conference could produce an new-fangled oppositional movement.
And, as if all this isn’t enough to further fill editorial pages and environmental sections of newspapers, the BASIC block of nations will be meeting in South Africa at the end of the month. As much as I’m hoping the Bolivian conference will be a big boost to oppositional power and a thriving international climate justice movement, the future of international talks is squarely before the BASIC nations. Do they throw their support behind the Copenhagen Accord or remain supportive of Kyoto’s emphasis on the historical role rich countries have played in polluting the atmosphere and triggering global warming?
Stay tuned.
I’ll be blogging for the Huffington Post from Bolivia and keep an eye out for a wrap-up piece at the Nation from me about what comes out of the conference.
