In order to sharpen their negotiating clout during the high-level segment of COP17, leaders of the BASIC countries came together to declare that the Durban accord must carry a clear and ratifiable decision on the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol.
The four BASIC ministers, South Africa’s minister for water and environmental affairs Edna Molewa, Chinese minister and National Development and Reform Commission vice-chairman Xie Zhenhua, India’s environment minister Jayanti Natarajan and Brazilian ambassador to South Africa Luz Alberto Figueiredo shared a common platform Tuesday to send out a clear unity signal in their determination to take on the industrialised nations.
Taking the lead, Ms Natarajan made an impassioned plea that the developed world stop its present practice of asking the less developed nations to make a “payment each time an existing obligation becomes due”. She added: “We have already walked the extra mile and, in fact, are doing more than what our partners are doing.” Taking strong objection to the imposition of the carbon tax on civil aviation emissions by the EU under their Emissions Trading Scheme, she asserted that such unilateral measures violated the principles of CBDR. Ms Natarajan felt the time has come to “take stock of the performance of various groups of countries when the results of the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC are released, especially in the light of the actions taken by the developed world.”