Developed nations must cut emissions, says Denmark

NEW DELHI: Stressing the need for an outcome at the Copenhagen climate change summit, Denmark���s climate and energy minister Connie Hedegaard said that the ���political price of a failure at Copenhagen will be very high, but the highest price will have to be paid by the poorest people of the world.���

Ms Hedegaard put the onus firmly on the developed countries. Developed countries ���have contributed most and must deliver first. It is in the interest of developing countries that development must be as green as possible. Actions done domestically by developing countries must be taken into account at Copenhagen.���

The visiting minister who addressed the valedictory session of the New Delhi High Level Conference on Climate Change: Technology Development and Transfer said that developed countries must commit to emission cuts. Ms Hedegaard stressed that it was not enough to a political declaration at Copenhagen. ���We must deliver on all building blocks from the Bali Action Plan.���

The statement on global co-operation on climate technology adopted at the end of the two-day conference, however, failed to arrive at a consensus on the issue of sharing intellectual property rights. The logjam on the issue of sharing IPR is considered to be one of the hurdles to an outcome at the Copenhagen summit.

While Ms Hedegaard indicated that a comprehensive climate agreement may not be possible in time for the December summit, she said that the main building blocks should be hopefully in place.

There have been no resolution in the negotiations as most of the developed countries have failed to announce reduction of greenhouse gas emissions neither have they made any progress on committing funding towards help developing countries.