Culture Change Correspondent at the United Nations and International Editor
December 10, 2003

The Ninth Conference of the Parties that signed the UN convention on Climate Change brought close to 5,500 people to Milan from 180 nations. This figure includes 2,300 non-governmental organizations and 550 people from the media. The participants are from countries that did and did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol. In the latter category, the prominent countries are the US, Russia and Australia. All European Union member states and the candidate states of the EU, New Zealand, Canada, and Japan, have ratified.

According to the way the Kyoto Protocol (KP) was written, it will go into effect only if 55% of the signatories ratify. These include 55% of the CO2 emissions at the then specified date — 1990. There is no problem with the first condition, as 121 countries have ratified the KP. But thanks to the position of the US (the country at the forefront of greenhouse gas emissions), there is not going to be the required minimum of 55% of emissions without a Russian ratification of the KP. The decision of Australia in this respect is irrelevant, and they can follow the US example if they choose to do so. Russia is a different matter. Basically, all eyes are directed to what Russia intends to do. The signals from Russia are varied and, to say the least, intended to stall. The problem is not the Russians but rather the European Union: its bureaucracy, the bureaucracy of the major environmental movements, and the bureaucracy of the Climate Change Convention staff.

It is quite clear that after six years of effort (Kyoto was in 1997 at the third meeting of the COP), the EU does not want to walk away from the KP to try something new. The other groups mentioned above just cannot get off on the high of treading water and going to meetings.

The Russian contingent here is very large and varied. There are delegates connected to businesses that stand to profit from foreign investments if Russia does ratify. Also, the large NGOs in the West have brought over Russians to vouch that President Putin will ratify someday. First he had to wait for the elections to the Duma, then for his own re-election to the Presidency, then for the US elections in 2004 — so nothing will happen before November 2004. The facts are rather different: Seemingly, Mr. Putin is putting international politics ahead of anything else, and the situation in Chechnya may be the major factor.

Also, the fact that in Kyoto, Russia was able to get a good income from selling the famous “hot air” — that was the reduction of emissions when they closed the inefficient industries from Soviet times — but without the US as buyers, there is no market for this “hot air” or make-believe reductions in emissions. Without this incentive, why should they actually ratify? True, there are businesses in Russia that stand to benefit from the other mechanisms that were established in Kyoto, but Mr. Putin may have other political aims, as shown in his latest dealings with some of the oligarchs.

Mr. Illiaronow, a very close assistant to Mr. Putin from days prior to the Presidency, stated that Russia will not ratify. There is no reason to doubt him except for the lack of will to listen to him on the part of some people gathered here. Without the Russian ratification, one can safely say that Kyoto is DEAD. On the other hand, it does not make much sense in to be so trite. It would make much more sense simply to say: “Look, with or without Kyoto, Europe and its coalition of the willing will proceed to implement some of the mechanisms established in the Kyoto Protocol pending a new regime that will be established eventually.”

The best part of the events that occurred here in Milan was a feeling that this alternative is looked at seriously now, after a sense of weakening infatuation with the Russian presenters here. The side events of their appearing full packed last week are quite empty this week; they simply do not seem to have the truth at their fingertips. In a press conference with the German Green Minister of the Environment on December 10th, it became clear that he is calling for action now, even though he recognizes that this means acting without the KP in place. He said that the Russians will eventually come along some day, but says we can’t wait for them. In the meantime, he says, we must act and such actions are already in process.

At the first round-table of the ministerial level of the meeting, it became obvious that many participants in the discussion were dealing with such actions without spending time talking of the Kyoto Protocol.

(This article was first posted on CultureChange.org)

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