Copenhagen shows we need caution in Cancun

摘要

What can we expect from the next round of international climate negotiations, which begin next week in Cancun, Mexico? A lead negotiator from a major developing country recently told me that the probable outcome was "anybody's guess". That gives me an uncomfortable feeling that Cancun will be Copenhagen revisited. There are many good reasons why that climate conference last year proved so difficult, and delivered what it did (or did not). Two should be borne in mind.rnFirst, there was no shared understanding of what the conference was supposed to deliver. The 2008 Bali Action Plan, the document that underpinned the process intended to culminate in Copenhagen, spoke of decisions being taken. But what decisions? Some countries argued that the world needed to adopt a new legal treaty under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which would set a series of binding targets for industrialized countries and herald the demise of the Kyoto Protocol.