BASIC to meet UN deadline

At the second most important climate change meeting a month after the Copenhagen fiasco, the BASIC nations (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) said they would meet the January 31 deadline to give information on voluntary mitigation action to the United Nation’s panel on climate change.

In the day-long meeting, the four environment ministers also emphasised that the BASIC group would add value to the G-77 rather than use its muscle on the more vulnerable and poor countries to pursue its agenda. The members further said the Copenhagen accord was a political agreement and not a legally binding one.

“The BASIC group is a platform to reflect and strategise for negotiations and it will not be a group parallel to G-77. This group will neither take decisions for G-77 nor would it superimpose its decisions on other members,” South African minister of water and environment affairs Buyelwa Sonjica said. The group wants to add value to G-77, she said.

Squarely blaming rich countries and their selfishness for the failure at Copenhagen, the BASIC members said the four countries were doing much more for more vulnerable and other poor countries than the promised $10-billion fund of the developed countries.

“It was frustrating in Copenhagen to see the selfishness of the rich countries. If we add the support of BASIC countries to vulnerable and poor countries, it would overcome the $10-billion fund promised by developed economies. We want the US to lead the process and not lag behind as they did in Copenhagen. US has a moral obligation to take lead and deliver in Mexico,” Brazilian minister for environment Carlos Minc said.

The members said that flow of funds to island nations, Africa, and least developed countries should happen early.

Only that can prove rich countries were serious abbout urgently addressing the global challenge on climate change, they said.

The BASIC countries also came out with the decision that they would meet the January 31 deadline and would provide information on mitigation action to UN’s climate change panel.

“The members of the BASIC group have already announced a series of voluntary mitigation actions. We will inform the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) by January 31,” minister for environment and forests Jairam Ramesh said.

After coming out of the meeting, the four environment ministers also said there was “no hope” for the Copenhagen accord to become legally binding and it would only remain a political agreement.

“The Copenhagen accord has no hope of becoming a legal agreement. All of us support the accord, but we think that it cannot be a standalone document. Its inputs could be used for the two-track negotiation process under UNFCCC,” added Ramesh.

The powerful developing economy group has demanded president of the Conference of Parties (CoP) to hold at least five meetings of the ad hoc working group on long-term cooperation action. It also wants the ad hoc working group to meet on further emission reduction commitments for developed countries before the CoP-16 in Mexico in December.