Negotiations for a climate treaty stalled in Geneva last week, as the
US continued to reject European proposals for target reductions in emissions
of greenhouse gases. Japan eventually proposed a treaty based on ‘pledge
and review’. This would require governments to present their national plans
to an international review body, but would impose no particular goals.
The Japanese proposal now seems the only likely candidate for support
by the US and other industrialised countries in time for the planned signing
of a climate treaty in Brazil next year. Chinese and Indian delegates made
it clear that if rich countries do not make substantial cuts in greenhouse
emissions, developing countries would be unlikely to curb their own.
Paul Hohnen of Greenpeace said it was disastrous for European countries
and Japan, which have set their own targets for reducing greenhouse emissions,
to back away from international targets in order to keep the US in the negotiations.