New Delhi:
Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has said that climate summit at Copenhagen is good for India, for the world and the Earth. However, green activists have slammed the accord terming it a complete failure.
Jairam Ramesh, who has just returned from Copenhagen after the tortuous negotiations on Climate Change, said that India's interests have been well protected.
He said the Copenhagen accord is 'a first good step, which is good for India, good for the world and good for the Earth'.
After stormy meetings and hectic negotiations, the UN-sponsored Climate Summit has come to a close in Copenhagen, but with more questions than answers.
The 192 participating countries only 'took note' of the US brokered deal with India, China, Brazil and South Africa, which promised to limit gas emissions to 2 degrees Celsius of pre-industrial levels.
(Read: Climate Summit 'notes' Copenhagen Accord)
Many smaller countries rejected the deal outright.
In the end, after two weeks of hard bargaining, the conference failed to adopt a legally binding treaty on emission cuts.
(Pics from Copenhagen Summit)But has India got a deal from the summit as environment minister Jairam Ramesh claimed? Or have the BASIC nations let off the rich countries too easily?
(Read/Watch: India has got "a good deal": Jairam)Green activists say it was a complete failure and have given negative comments on the Copenhagen accord.
"There are no legally binding targets that the developed countries have to meet. So, in terms of that, that's one of the major premises of how we are going to tackle global warming and climate change. In terms of that we are saying it is a complete failure. We have failed to agree at a sort of solution which will lead us to a viable action plan towards controlling climate change. And we believe that it is a disastrous summit and it is specially disastrous for India's poor and the vulnerable section because they are going to be most severely hit," said Suparno Banerjee, spokesperson for Centre For Science and Environment, a public interest research and advocacy organization.
"India buckled under pressure in Copenhagen. Non-legally binding agreement will weak emission cuts from the developed world. The Copenhagen Accord that India plans to sign will erase both historical responsibility and the distinction between industrialised and non-industrialised countries from future climate change negotiations," said a statement by the Centre for Science for Environment.
According to Greenpeace (India): "This has been a shirking of global responsibility by India and a weak outcome has so-far emerged from the UN climate talks."
The deal is not ambitious, is unfair, not legally binding and likely to put the world on a path to at least a 3C temperature rise, Greenpeace said.
"Seven hundred million Indians are dependent on climate sensitive sectors and resources. The failure to reach an ambitious and legally binding agreement pushes them further to the brink," Greenpeace said.
Also read:
The road to Copenhagen
Rising temperature, sinking planet