By IANS,
New Delhi : With six days to go for the UN conference on climate change, US President Barack Obama Tuesday rang up Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to seek support for the Copenhagen summit, with India making it clear that it will play “a constructive role” for “a successful outcome” at the 192-nation conference.
Obama’s telephone call came a week after he held wide-ranging talks with Manmohan Singh in Washington that included evolving a consensus at the Cophenhagen conference and the two countries forging collaboration in green technologies and moving towards a green economy.
Although the phone conversation focussed on steps needed to bring peace and stability in Afghanistan, the two leaders spent some time talking about the upcoming conference that is currently embroiled in competing positions and bargaining among developed and developing countries.
“The two leaders discussed the forthcoming summit on climate change in Copenhagen,” the prime minister’s office said in a statement.
The prime minister told Obama: “India will play a constructive role in the negotiations and looked forward to a successful outcome,” the statement said.
Obama’s call reinforced speculation about pressure mounting on India to play a “deal maker” at the conference that is expected to take forward the Kyoto Protocol on reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases that are causing global warming, or to come up with a successor to the protocol.
Two days ago in Trinidad and Tobago, Manmohan Singh met French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown who emphasised the need for India to join the ongoing negotiations for a substantive outcome at the Cophenhagen conference.
In his intervention at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting at the Trinidadian capital, Manmohan Singh spelt out India’s position. He talked of the need for a “balanced and comprehensive outcome” at Copenhagen based on equitable burden-sharing. In a veiled attack at developed countries, Manmohan Singh also warned the 53-nation summit against pursuing protectionism under a green label.
In the wake of recent announcements by the US and China, pressure has intensified on India to announce some form of quantifiable climate change actions.
“India is at the crossroads” on this issue, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) chief R.K. Pachauri said at a press conference here, urging Manmohan Singh to attend the final two days of the Dec 7-18 summit. “This will be important, as it will signify that India is a deal maker and not a deal breaker,” he said.
Pachauri predicted that US President Barack Obama’s announcement that his country would cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 17 percent by 2020, compared to 2005, and China’s announcement that it would reduce the GHG-intensity of its economy by 40-45 percent by 2020, compared to 2005, would put more pressure on India to come up with similar quantitative commitments.