By Joydeep Gupta, IANS,
As the climate change summit here entered its final stages Friday without signs of reaching a conclusion, a senior member of the Indian government delegation remarked that “EU obduracy is about to wreck this summit”.
Coming out of the room where ministers from around the world were holding a closed-door meeting to finalise the outcomes of the Dec 1-12 Poznan summit, the official told IANS that the European Union (EU) delegation was “blocking progress on three key issues”.
Even as EU ministers meeting in Brussels were giving final shape to their contentious energy and environment policy, the official said on condition of anonymity: “The EU has not allowed the Adaptation Fund (AF) to become operational by insisting that it be administered by the World Bank”.
The AF is supposed to help least developed countries (LDC) cope with climate change effects. The LDCs have been seeking “direct access” to the fund in times of weather emergencies, something they feel they cannot have if the World Bank administers the it.
The official said the EU had also blocked the other major outcome hoped at Poznan – the reform of the clean development mechanism (CDM) by which developing countries are rewarded for green projects.
“They have done it in two ways, first by not allowing the fund to be expanded, and second by insisting that CCS (carbon capture and storage) be included among CDM projects.
“They want to turn the CDM into a MOM – a mitigation outsourcing mechanism. This is not going to work.”
(Joydeep Gupta can be contacted at [email protected])