Barcelona UN climate change talks ends with little progress
0 
The Barcelona UN climate change talks, which is the last negotiating session before the historic UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December, ended Friday night with too little progress on key issues to pave the way for a full-fledged agreement at Copenhagen.
Speaking at the closing press conference in Barcelona, UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer said that progress on adaptation, technology cooperation, reducing emissions from deforestation in developing countries and mechanisms to disburse funds for developing countries was made in Barcelona.
However, little progress was made on the two key issues of mid-term emission reduction targets of developed countries and finance that would allow developing countries to limit their emissions growth and adapt to the inevitable effects of climate change.
The UN climate chief said: "Without these two pieces of the puzzle in place, we will not have a deal in Copenhagen."
"So leadership at the highest level is required to unlock the pieces," he said, adding "it is essential that practical action is swiftly implemented."
"I look to industrialized countries to raise their ambitions to meet the scale of the challenge we face," said Yvo de Boer, "and I look to industrialized nations for clarity on the amount of short and long-term finance they will commit."
During the Barcelona negotiations, there is an essential difference between developed and developing countries on whether to go ahead with the Kyoto Protocol. The difference emerged during the UN climate change talks in Bangkok.
At the closing plenary session of the Barcelona talks, Ibrahim Mirghani Ibrahim, who is head of the Sudanese delegation and spoke on behalf of Group of 77 and China, said "the Group will strongly stand against all attempts by developed countries to reach an agreement which would in any way result in the Kyoto Protocol being superseded or made redundant."
"A second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol must be established for a period beyond 2012 as the legal basis for comparable Annex I emission reduction commitments," Ibrahim said.
More than 4,500 participants, including delegates from around 180 countries, attended the Barcelona negotiations, which are the last round of talks on climate change before the Copenhagen conference in December.
The Copenhagen conference is scheduled to set the mid-term emission reduction targets for developed countries under Kyoto Protocol, and make substantial arrangements for the implementation of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Comments