By IANS
Bali (Indonesia) : The Indian government delegation at the final stage of the 12-day UN conference on climate change here will be led by Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal, according to senior officials here.
“The UN secretary general called the prime minister Saturday and requested that India be represented at the cabinet level,” Ajay Mathur, director general of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency in the Ministry of Power, told IANS here.
“Since the prime minister is himself the environment minister at the cabinet level, it was decided that Mr Sibal would head the delegation,” he said.
Ministers from most of the 187 countries attending the summit are expected to be here Dec 12-14. UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon is himself scheduled to arrive on Dec 10.
India has thus upped the importance it gives to the climate change summit. Earlier, Minister of State for Environment and Forests Namo Narain Meena was scheduled to head the government delegation.
Sibal recently headed the Indian delegation to the Nov 26-28 US-sponsored international conference on the Middle East in Annapolis, Maryland.