The suggestion of Mr. Marthinus van Schalkwyk presents some very interesting dilemmas:

- first, it proposes an African for the position and we believe this is a bit like putting the carriage before the horse. Indeed, we say all the time that Africa is suffering because of the sins of others, so Africa and the Island States have most reasons to see a Climate  agreement become reality, but then it is not the sufferers, but the sinners, that will have to sign up to an enforceable  agreement, and those are mainly China and the US. Here indeed South Africa is one of the additional three IBSA states that participated in the formulation of the Copenhagen notice. If one where to try to pick a lead country from among the IBSA – we suggested it be Brazil as it would have the least conflicts of interest from among the three.

- then, the appointment of Mr. van Schalwyk, a South African, would also mean that there will be the third Dutch person on that job in a row, albeit, this Dutchman comes from South Africa and not from the Netherlands, but nevertheless the subject will come up.

- also, as we know the 2010 meeting of the UNFCCC, or COP 16, will be held in Mexico, while the following one, the 2011 COP 17 is intended for South Africa. An appointment of a South African to head the UNFCCC at this time would mean that the Mexico meeting that is limping anyway – as we just posted an hour ago – will become completely useless. Some, like the Latin American States, will find this objectionable. This one point leaves us perplexed if we sense that Cancun is just one more UN ritual led so that it has beforehand no chance to succeed – who knows – maybe the appointment of Mr. van Schlkwyk could actually result in annulment of a UN scheduled event. That could then be the first emissions saving UN led activity.

- the last point has to do with the backing of Mugabe’s Zimbabwe from South Africa in the leadership of The UN Commission on Sustainable Development. The facts are that the CSD was destroyed because of that backing by South Africa, and the CSD is needed if one wants to find a base for climate activities at the UN. That past experience might have left, and who knows, perhapse still creates, a sour taste when looking at South Africa’s place in UN leadership. Will we do away also with the CSD and base climate on the Committee of 19 Wise Men that the UN Secretary-General just established?

Without taking a stand on the candidate himself, nevertheless the first three points we raised will probably have to be weighed against the attributes that might be proposed when other names become available.

==============

from: BuaNews (Tshwane)
South Africa: Zuma Nominates Van Schalkwyk for Top UN Job.

8 March 2010, Pretoria — President Jacob Zuma has nominated Tourism Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk for the post of the United Nations’ new climate chief.

Van Schalkwyk has been tipped as a strong contender to take over from Yvo De Boer who headed the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC). De Boer announced his resignation last month.

“The South African government will consequently forward the name of Minister Van Schalkwyk to the Secretary General for his further consideration,” the Presidency said on Monday.

Zuma and the minister met on Sunday to discuss this issue as well as South Africa’s global positioning, the Presidency said.

“The final decision on the appointment rests with the Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki Moon.”

Van Schalkwyk was deeply involved in climate change issues during his tenure as minister of environmental affairs and tourism.

He built a strong profile for himself during the UN climate treaty negotiations leading up to the Copenhagen summit late last year.

“During this period he commanded significant respect across the developing-developed country divide. This will stand him in good stead in this critical phase of driving the global climate change negotiations to conclusion,” said the Presidency.

Given that South Africa will also be hosting and presiding over the climate change negotiations next year, the Presidency said it would be an “honour for the country to have one of its own to head up this very important UN institution”.

If appointed, Van Schalkwyk will oversee one of the most important treaties of the 21st century – the 2012 treaty on climate change. The treaty is aimed at mitigating the causes and effects of climate change and shape the way countries power their economies.

——————-
And from NASTASYA TAY (AP):  South African minister is nominated for UN post.

JOHANNESBURG — The South African president’s office announced the nomination of its tourism minister for the United Nations’ top climate post on Monday.

The office said in a press release that Marthinus van Schalkwyk is a candidate to direct the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. The current leader of the post, Yvo de Boer, announced his resignation in February and will step down July 1.
Van Schalkwyk was South Africa’s former minister for environmental affairs and tourism and is well-regarded in climate change circles. He has a reputation as an effective bridge-builder in a process that often pits developing against industrially advanced countries.

“We are pleased to know Minister Van Schalkwyk is being considered and would be very confident that he would be equal to the task of replacing Mr. de Boer,” said Themba Linden, Political Advisor at Greenpeace Africa. “By all accounts, he has an excellent standing as a negotiator, and has earned a great deal of respect for being very engaged and informed.”

Van Schalkwyk’s chances of being appointed are bolstered by the high likelihood that South Africa will host the U.N.’s climate change negotiations in 2011.

South Africa along with the U.S., India, Brazil and China drafted the climate change agreement reached in Denmark in December. The compromise calls for reducing emissions to keep temperatures from rising more than 2 C (3.6 F) above preindustrial levels. The nonbinding agreement also calls on rich nations to spend billions to help poor nations deal with drought and other impacts of climate change, and to develop clean energy.

Even though it helped draft the accord, South Africa joined a chorus of critics, expressing disappointment at not reaching a legally binding climate change agreement.

—————–
 http://www.businessgreen.com/business-gr…

Could it be that his oponent will be an Indian backed by China? The guesing game may just go wild from now on:

There have also been reports in India that environment minister Jairam Ramesh has nominated Indian environment secretary Vijai Sharma for the role, and his nomination is believed to be supported by China.

However, an Indian or Chinese nomination is likely to be opposed by the US and EU, which remain angry at both country’s negotiating tactics during the final days of the Copenhagen Summit.

As such, Van Schalkwyk is likely to be regarded as a potential conciliatory candidate, securing the support of the many Africa countries that will be most directly affected by climate change and providing a potential link between the US and Europe and the so-called BASIC group of emerging economies, of which South Africa is a member alongside Brazil, India and China.

His nomination chances will be further bolstered by the likelihood that South Africa will host next year’s main UN climate change summit where diplomats still hope an international treaty agreed later this year in Mexico can be formally adopted.

EU Climate Chief delivers Treaty blow.

by Fiona Harvey, Environment Correspondent
8th March 2010
 http://crazationsice.blogspot.com/2010/0…

The world will almost certainly fail to draw up a new treaty on climate change this year, the minister in charge of last year’s Copenhagen summit has admitted, delivering a heavy blow to the barely flickering hopes for a swift global settlement.

Connie Hedegaard, the Danish minister who masterminded the summit of world leaders on global warming last year and is now the European commissioner for climate change, told the Financial Times negotiations were not progressing fast enough for a treaty to be signed soon.

She also gave warning that pushing too hard for a treaty this year could be counterproductive.

“To get every detail set in the next nine months looks very difficult,” she said. “Europe would love that to happen, and I would love that to happen . . . but my feeling is that it is going to be very difficult to get a treaty.”

Her pessimism echoed that of the outgoing United Nations climate change chief, Yvo de Boer. He told the FT as he resigned last month after four years of seeking an agreement that he could not see a treaty being signed this year.

The admission also comes against the backdrop of a resurgence of climate change scepticism, fuelled by a series of mistakes made by scientists that have encouraged many politicians to oppose emissions regulation.

Governments had been hoping to forge a final treaty at a global conference this December in Mexico, after failing to do so in Copenhagen.

However, Ms Hedegaard said this was more likely to happen at a follow-up meeting next year in South Africa.

That would still allow governments to meet their self-imposed deadline of forging a new agreement before the end of 2012, when the current provisions of the world’s only existing treaty on greenhouse gas emissions, the 1997 Kyoto protocol, expire.

Ms Hedegaard robustly defended the Copenhagen summit, which attracted loud criticism, especially for the chaotic way in which it finished.

She said that calling world leaders to the long-running negotiations had ensured rapid progress towards the end, when for the first time developed and developing countries mutually agreed limits on their emissions.

But she said there would not be another Copenhagen-style summit. “You can do such a thing one time,” she said.

The price of failure, if diplomats attempted to force an agreement this year, was too high, Ms Hedegaard said.

“People would say let’s skip that idea, let’s skip the UN thing,” she said.

She also defended climate scientists, saying the handful of flaws in the 2007 report by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the e-mails in which scientists talked of concealing data did not affect the large body of scientific evidence amassed over decades.

The UN climate talks have been going on since 1992, when world governments signed the first legally binding treaty aimed at avoiding dangerous levels of climate change. The Kyoto protocol failed because it did not impose obligations on developing countries and was rejected by the US.

——————-

Connie Hedegaard: Statement of CONNIE HEDEGAARD, European Commissioner for Climate Action, on the creation of the Directorate-General CLIMATE “The DG CLIMATE has been created …
ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/hedegaard/index_en.htm

From: ALDE-PRESS <press@alde.eu>
Date: Thu, Feb 11, 2010

Distribution: immediate – February 11, 2010, 1:19 pm
Verhofstadt: 20 years on, Mandela’s dream is alive

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s release from jail, which signalled the end of apartheid, Guy Verhofstadt the President of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe made the following statement:

“The dream of Nelson Mandela is still alive. February 11, 1990 was a historical day for South Africa and the World. It was the symbol of tolerance, anti-apartheid and anti-racism. South Africa is now an equal player at the world’s top table. The transformation that took place in the country should serve us both as an inspiration and a reminder of what the courage of one man can do in the plight for freedom.

Mandela’s commitment to peace has been unwavering. I remember very well how we cooperated in Central Africa’s peace process. This brought the end of the war after the terrible genocide. It was thanks to Mandela that this peace was reached.”

Louis Michel (MR, Belgium) and former commissioner for development added:

“Mandela’s fight is witness that the conscience of a single man can illuminate the whole of humanity and transform the world for the better.”

For more information, please contact:

Neil Corlett: +33-3-88 17 41 67 or +32-478-78 22 84
e-mail:  neil.corlett at europarl.europa.eu
Web: http://www.alde.eu

 http://ipsterraviva.net/UN/currentNew.as…

South-South Cooperation Key to MDGs
IPS Correspondents

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 7 (IPS) – Member states meeting here Thursday called for the immediate implementation of development commitments made during the Nairobi high-level U.N. conference on cooperation between developing countries.

UNDP Administrator Helen Clark highlighted the importance of the Nairobi meeting on South-South cooperation in sharing information, technologies, and experiences across the South. The Nairobi outcome document calls for concrete measures to mainstream support for South-South and triangular cooperation in the U.N.’s work.

“I can assure you that we in UNDP have received that loud and clear message,” Clark said. “We have long proudly hosted the Special Unit for South-South Cooperation and fully supported its work.” On the heels of Thursday’s General Assembly High-level Committee on South-South Cooperation (HLC) meeting, focal points of South-South cooperation at 29 U.N. agencies met Friday at headquarters to discuss follow-up to the Nairobi conference.

“South-South cooperation is an expression of solidarity that has proven its relevance by a rapid growth,” said Ambassador Abdullah M. Alsaidi of Yemen, the chair of the Group of 77 developing countries.

“Cooperation across the South has been transformed by the growth of the emerging economies,” Clark explained.

The share of global GDP generated by low and middle income countries has grown from 15 percent to 25 percent over the last 50 years according to UNDP estimates, and analysts predict that emerging markets will outperform developed markets over the course of the next decade.

“Strengthening of regional integration and improved networking among members of regional blocs and organisations has a multiplier effect to South-South cooperation,” said Ambassador Zachary Muburi-Muita of Kenya, who was elected president of the HLC meeting here.

“The emerging economies in the South are attracting international attention and will increasingly acquire the muscle to influence the course of economic growth and development,” said Ambassador Gyan Chandra Acharya of Nepal, stressing that the recent successes of the developing world are in danger of being reversed and are not being felt equally across countries or regions.

Despite the gains achieved through trade and finance, delegations noted the deepening economic asymmetries among developing countries, particularly in regard to the least developed countries (LDCs) and landlocked developing countries.

The HLC stressed that the current financial, food and energy crises have exacerbated the vulnerabilities of developing countries that lack the capacity to withstand shocks.

There is an “implementation gap” that has been looming over the recommendations of the major U.N. conferences in the economic and social areas, delegates agreed.

It is only with “political will towards fulfilling the commitments that parties have undertaken in Nairobi that we can make real progress,” an Egyptian delegate stressed.

“South-South cooperation is immensely important at this time for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and other internationally agreed goals, and for tackling climate change,” said Clark.

Clark urged delegations to take a particularly close look at the gender aspects of achieving the MDGs.

“Progress is lagging behind particularly on MDG5 on maternal health; on MDG3 on empowering women; and on MDG2 with respect to gender parity in access to education,” Clark said, “To achieve the MDGs and indeed other internationally agreed development goals, women have to be an equal part of the equation.”

In order to effectively implement the Nairobi outcome with demonstrable results, stakeholders need to identify “quick wins” whose implementation should be devoid of unnecessary red tape and bureaucracy, said Muburi-Muita.

The government of Brazil and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) have signed agreements on South-South cooperation to prevent and combat child labour and to promote good practices and lessons learned in Latin America and Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa and Asia.

“This is an excellent example of how member states are able to engage entities of the U.N. system through a South-South and triangular partnership in support of their national development strategies,” according to the ILO delegation.

The HLC stressed local ownership of solutions as a key component of South-South cooperation.

“Now, as UNDP positions itself to be of the greatest possible relevance and support to developing countries in the 21st century, we see facilitating South-South exchanges of experience and knowledge as absolutely central to what we do,” Clark explained.

A growing priority of the U.N. will be to share experience on climate change adaptation and mitigation. This could include sharing knowledge on growing drought-tolerant crops, on reforestation, or on providing low-cost access to clean energy and transport technology.

Clark emphasised that a very wide range of developing countries make contributions to South-South cooperation. In the recent weeks “we have seen least developed and low-income countries, along with middle-income and net-contributing countries, digging deep into their pockets for Haiti,” she said.

The problem was the 51 cents/gallon of ethanol from sugar-cane tariff, the US imposes against imports from international producers of bioethanol – so they do not compete with US agro-ethanol.

We are cynics by nature and wonder if the release today has anything to do with Shell Oil Company having announced last weekend that they will invest over a billion dollars in the production of sugar-cane ethanol in Brazil. So, did we have to wait until an oil company steps heavily into this area – so we finally allow US door to be opened to a non-petroleum liquid fuel?

WE ARE VERY PARTIAL TO THIS TOPIC BECAUSE BACK IN 1978 AT UNIDO IN VIENNA, AND IN 1979 IN NEW ORLEANS, I WAS PERSONALLY INVOLVED IN BRINGING THIS SUBJECT TO THE ATTENTION OF THE LIQUID FUEL HUNGRY WESTERN WORLD. IN VIENNA WE SHOWED THE CUBAN EXPERIENCE AT A UN – AUSTRIA – SWEDEN EVENT. IN NEW ORLEANS THIS WAS “THE FIRST INTER-AMERICAN CONFERENCE ON RENEWABLE SOURCES OF ENERGY” THAT I HELPED ORGANIZE. OBVIOUSLY – TO LOUISIANA WE COULD NOT BRING THE CUBANS – BUT BRAZIL, ARGENTINA AND MANY OTHERS WERE PRESENT UNDER THE FRIENDLY EYES OF THE US DEPARTMENT OF STATE. ETHANOL BECAME A RECOGNIZED FUEL, BUT US AGRICULTURE MADE SURE IT WILL BE US CORN AS FEEDSTOCK. WE COULD NOT EVEN GET PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT FOR IMPORTS FROM FRIENDLY COUNTRIES BECAUSE OIL AND AGRICULTURE – SOME OF THE STRONGEST LOBBIES IN WASHINGTON – WOULD NOT ALLOW IT , EVEN AFTER THE INTERVENTION OF US REPUBLICAN SENATORS LIKE FRANK CHURCH, JACOB JAVITS, CHARLES PERCY – SO WHAT WILL IT BE NOW? WILL THOSE TARIFFS COME OFF?

—————-
EPA Reaffirms Sugarcane Biofuel is Advanced Renewable Fuel with 61% Less Emissions than Gasoline.
Brazil Sugarcane Update – Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Welcomes U.S. EPA’s Renewable Fuels Rules.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has confirmed that ethanol made from sugarcane is a low carbon renewable fuel, which can contribute significantly to the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. As part of today’s announcement finalizing regulations for the implementation of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2), the EPA designated sugarcane ethanol as an advanced biofuel that lowers GHG emissions by more than 50%.

“The EPA’s decision underscores the many environmental benefits of sugarcane ethanol and reaffirms how this low carbon, advanced renewable fuel can help the world mitigate against climate change while diversifying America’s energy resources,” said Joel Velasco, Chief Representative in Washington for the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association (UNICA).

Sugarcane ethanol is a renewable fuel refined from cane that grows typically in tropical climates. Compared to other types of ethanol available today, using sugarcane ethanol to power cars and trucks yields greater reductions in greenhouse gases and is usually much cheaper for drivers to purchase. Brazil has replaced more than half of its fuel needs with sugarcane ethanol – making gasoline the alternative fuel in that country and ethanol the standard.  Many observers point to sugarcane ethanol as a good option for diversifying U.S. energy supplies, increasing healthy competition among biofuel manufacturers and improving America’s energy security.

The RFS2 will help the United States meet energy security and greenhouse gas reduction goals sought by the Energy Security and Independence Act of 2007 (EISA). The new regulations establish minimum biofuels consumption in the U.S. of more than 12 billion gallons (45 billion liters) in 2010, rising to 36 billion gallons (136 billion liters) in 2022, of which 21 billion gallons per year would have to be one of three types of advanced biofuels: cellulosic, biomass diesel, and “other advanced,” that meet required GHG reduction thresholds as determined by the EPA.

Today, EPA affirmed that sugarcane ethanol meets the “other advanced” category in the RFS2, although with a GHG reduction level that exceeds the requirement for all categories as well.  Specifically, EPA’s calculations show that sugarcane ethanol from Brazil reduces GHG emissions compared to gasoline by 61%, using a 30-year payback for indirect land use change (iLUC) emissions.

“We are pleased that EPA took the time to improve the regulations, particularly by more accurately quantifying the full lifecycle greenhouse emission reductions of biofuels. EPA’s reaffirmation of sugarcane ethanol’s superior GHG reduction confirms that sustainably-produced biofuels can play a important role in climate mitigation. Perhaps this recognition will sway those who have sought to raise trade barriers against clean energy here in the U.S. and around the world. Sugarcane ethanol is a first generation biofuel with third generation performance,” noted Velasco.

Last year, UNICA submitted comments to EPA with abundant scientifically credible evidence showing that – even including indirect emissions – sugarcane ethanol has a reduction of GHG emissions of 73-82% compared with gasoline, on a 30- or 100-year time horizon respectively. The RFS2 requires the use of at least 4 billion gallons (over 15 billion liters) of “other advanced” renewable fuels a year by 2022. In 2010, the RFS requires 200 million gallons of this type of advanced renewable fuels.

“While we are reviewing the final rule, it is clear that EPA has incorporated many of the comments that UNICA and other stakeholders made during the public process. EPA should be congratulated for the way it upheld the Obama’s goals of transparency and scientific integrity in the environmental rulemaking. And we hope that other governments should take note of the manner that EPA has handled this process,” concluded Velasco.

Brazil is a leader in the production of sugarcane ethanol, which is widely considered as the most efficient biofuel available today. In 2009, Brazil produced over 7 billion gallons of sugarcane ethanol, most of which is used in Brazil in flex fuel vehicles. As a result of Brazil’s innovative use of sugarcane ethanol in transportation and biomass for cogeneration, sugarcane is the leading source of renewable energy in the nation, representing 16% of the country’s total energy needs. In fact, gasoline has become the alternative in Brazil, reducing the country’s dependence on fossil fuels lowering emissions. A recent study in the November 2009 edition of the journal Energy Policy indicated that since 1975, over 600 million tons of CO2 emissions have been avoided thanks to the use of ethanol in Brazil.

———

ABOUT UNICA. The Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association (UNICA) represents the
top producers of sugar and ethanol in the country’s South-Central region, especially the
state of Sao Paulo, which accounts for about 50% of the country’s sugarcane harvest
and 60% of total ethanol production. UNICA develops position papers, statistics and
specific research in support of Brazil’s sugar, ethanol and bioelectricity sectors. In 2008,
Brazil produced an estimated 565 million metric tons of sugarcane, which yielded 31.3
million tons of sugar and 25.7 billion liters (6.8 billion gallons) of ethanol, making it the
number-one sugarcane grower and sugar producer in the world, and the second-largest
ethanol producer on the planet, behind the United States.

—————-

Brazil Hopes Shell-Cosan Can Boost Ethanol Exports

Date: 04-Feb-10, Reuters from Brazil
Author: Inae Riveras – Analysis

SAO PAULO – Brazil’s ethanol industry, which invested heavily to boost output of the cane-based biofuel, is counting on a tie-up between sugar and ethanol producer Cosan and Royal Dutch Shell Plc to revive its prospects after exports fell short of expectations.

“Shell chose ethanol as the renewable fuel they want to be in and it chose Brazil. Whether this will mean more exports will depend on a series of circumstances beyond the companies’ control,” said ethanol expert Eduardo Pereira de Carvalho.

The slow rate of growth for ethanol exports has disappointed Brazil, where more than 450 mills joined the ethanol sector’s expansion drive in recent years.

Some analysts say any growth in ethanol exports will depend on oil prices more than other factor.

“The deal itself does not raise or reduce the economic viability of blending anhydrous ethanol in gasoline. This will be determined by the oil market,” said sugar and ethanol analyst Julio Maria Borges, director at Job Economia.

In 2008, when oil prices reached record highs of $147 per barrel, Brazil exported 5.1 billion liters of ethanol, up sharply from 3.5 billion liters the previous year. Countries simply bought more of the fuel to replace gasoline.

But oil prices tumbled as the global credit crisis intensified, and there was a similar decline in foreign interest for the cane-based fuel. Brazilian ethanol exports in 2009 slipped to 3.3 billion liters despite extremely low prices on the Brazilian market.

STEADY SUPPLIES, TARIFFS

If ethanol is economically viable compared to oil, however, Brazilian ethanol exports should benefit from Shell’s global infrastructure, commercial relationships and know-how.

Shell, with distribution centers and 45,000 filling stations around the world, will have access to annual supplies of 2 billion liters of Cosan ethanol.

“Shell will be able to strike long-term deals with clients around the world, something that currently hardly exists, as it will be backed by a big provider,” Borges said.

“It’s difficult to predict (when exports could rise)… but the strategic meaning of a company the size of Shell to invest here is the most important point,” Carvalho said.

The EU refuses to see the multi headed Hydra it has become and expects President Obama to play along. Reality calls – EU please get serious at becoming some sort of one headed entity! The US President is a busy man now with all that US Jazz.

It slowly starts sinking in – we said it a long time ago!

Battling the ‘Multilateral Zombie’ – EU climate strategy after Copenhagen.
LEIGH PHILLIPS

February 3, 2010, http://euobserver.com/9/29354/?rk=1,
 http://old.norden.org/analysnorden/defau…

EUOBSERVER / ANALYSIS – “The EU’s post-Copenhagen strategy should be
just to have a strategy, any strategy,” quips one Brussels think-tank
wag during an interview.

The rough hip-check Europe received in the Danish capital in December,
sidelining the bloc during the eleventh-hour huddle between major
powers that produced the Copenhagen Accord, has produced a wave of
despondency and cynicism amongst Brussels politicians, green
lobbyists, and analysts – and carbon traders across the continent to
boot. They’re all having a crack at how poorly the EU played its hand
during climate negotiations.

For the last three years, if it hasn’t been the institutional reform
of the Lisbon Treaty, it’s been the bloc’s obsession with climate
change that has dominated the EU agenda. Even if the EU is well off
the at least 40 percent cut in emissions that science demands if we
are to avoid catastrophic climate change, it remains the case that as
a result of its 2008 climate and energy package, Europe remains the
most advanced rich-country power on the planet in terms of its binding
CO2 reduction commitment.

With its climate boy-scout badge afixed to its sleeve, Brussels headed
off to Camp Copenhagen expecting at least to see its self-proclaimed
leadership reflected in winning something along the lines of a broad
commitment from other powers to at least a 20-percent cut in carbon
emissions below 1990 levels by 2020.

But in the end, the EU ended up the goody-two-shoes pupil who’s top of
the class, but yet, when he invites all the other kids over for a
party, glumly watches as they end up playing among each other instead
of with him. It was the US, China, India, Brazil and South Africa that
cobbled together the last-minute three-page-long Copenhagen Accord
without the EU even in the room, while most of the developing world
complained throughout the two weeks that Brussels was at best just a
cat’s paw for Washington.

Denmark’s Connie Hedegaard, now incoming EU
climate commissioner, was repeatedly attacked for favouring rich
countries over the developing world.

“It was the strangest conference I have been at in my life, from all
points of view,” Mr Barroso told a pow-wow of the leading European
think-tanks in early January.

Typical of the initial EU reaction were comments from Swedish
environment minister Andres Carlgren, who, when meeting in Brussels in
late December with his EU counterparts to debrief after the UN summit
and begin the discussion of what to do next, slammed the result as a
“disaster.”

“It was a really great failure and we have to learn from that,” he
said at the time. { but the gentleman forgot to say whose failure it was!}

Glass half full!

However, after the holidays, a clutch of pollyanna-ish EU officials
have since fervently urged everyone to consider the Accord’s silver
lining. Both President Barroso and the bloc’s chief climate
negotiator, Artur Runge-Metzger, in various venues have emphasised
that many of the things the EU had been pushing for were contained in
the final result – developed countries agreed for the first time a
concrete sum for climate finance, a target maximum average global
temperature increase of two degrees was embraced and a review,
allowing for a ratcheting up of targets if necessary, is foreseen for
2015.

At the same time, EU member states that have never been comfortable
with the bloc’s climate ambitions have used the opportunity to delay
or block European plans to boost its CO2 emissions reduction
commitment from 20 percent on 1990 levels to 30 percent. On 18
January, environment ministers met in Seville, to assess, for the
second time, the reasons for the failure in the Danish capital. UK,
France, Germany, Belgium and Spain continued to push for the increased
pledge, while Italy and Poland said now was not the time given the
poverty of ambition by other states at Copenhagen.

As of this week, the consensus in the bloc is to maintain its target
of 20 percent and conditional offer of 30 percent if other powers make
comparable efforts – in other words exactly the same position the EU
has held for the last year, although Ms Hedegaard has publicly said
she hopes to see a move to 30 percent “by Mexico,” meaning the next UN
climate summit in the Central American nation at the end of 2010.

At the same time, the commission itself is in the ‘twenty-percenter’
camp, pushing this position in Copenhagen, “afraid to be naked” with
nothing left to put on the table in the game of climate strip poker.
Moreover, crucially, the executive’s goal of a transatlantic emissions
trading system is unworkable with cuts pledges that are wildly
divergent and without legally binding commitments from Washington.

The US is looking to a 17 percent emissions reduction on 2005 levels,
which works out to be just three percent when using the same 1990
baseline year as the EU. Watch for the US, if legislation gets
through, at some point to somehow nudge up its cut to 20 percent and
the EU to stick to the same figure, dressed up in language about how
the two targets are now comparable, with a fudge over the differing
baseline years.

Support unravelling:

Separately, four of the five architects of the Accord, Brazil, South
Africa, India and China, have themselves gone lukewarm on the project,
smarting from accusations from much of the rest of the developing
world that these four richest of the poor countries had broken ranks
after a year of unprecedented global south unity.

“The two-track negotiating process …is the only legitimate process
to reach a legally binding treaty in Mexico,” he added.

Meanwhile, the cornerstone of the Accord, an understanding that
however limited America’s commitment, Washington would at least be
able to deliver on this promise.

But with the surprise election to the US Senate of Massachusetts
Republican Scott Brown on an anti-climate-bill ticket, killing the
Democrat’s filibuster-proof majority, the country’s climate
legislation is threatened. A defeated or heavily watered down bill
only engenders further reservations in the minds of Chinese, Indian
and even European leadership about promising tough reduction targets.

For all the public talk of Latin American, Chinese and African climate
“villains” blocking the process in Copenhagen, privately, there is
frustration with Washington as well. A senior EU policy official
speaking to EUobserver described President Obama’s position as the
same as that of George Bush. “We are willing but only if others move,”
the official said, attributing the position to both the current and
former US leaders.

One EU climate voice {?}

A popular post-Copenhagen analysis from the Brookings Institute, the
centrist US think-tank, that has made the rounds of officialdom and
NGO-land warns of a slow-motion failure scenario similar to the Doha
round of WTO talks, a process it describes as a “multilateral zombie”
in which climate negotiations “stagger on piteously, never making much
progress while never quite dying either.”

Nevertheless, despite the dark days and the cynicism of some
onlookers, we can already begin to sense the outlines of a European
strategy.

EU Council President Herman Van Rompuy has already said he hopes to
see a common climate strategy emerge from an 11 February extraordinary
EU summit originally scheduled to deal with the economy. Angela
Merkel, as well, has upgraded a climate meeting in Bonn in June from
expert to ministerial level and the European Commission is preparing a
series of proposals that it is to put to the member states.

While this sort of member-state activity is likely to continue, the
Lisbon Treaty has given the commission a powerful new diplomatic
weapon it intends to use to the fullest.

Sidelining the UN:

Related to this, the major task will be to break the remarkable unity
shown by developing nations. The UNFCCC’s principle dating back to
Kyoto of “common but differentiated responsibility,” is understood by
developing nations to mean that those countries that caused the
problem should pay for solving it and make binding commitments to CO2
reductions.

The third world has said that it would be happy to develop along a
low-carbon path itself, but that the rich north will have to pay for
this and that their emissions cuts should in any case be voluntary.
The World Bank, unhelpfully, has estimated the cost of all this to be
$400 billion a year. Meanwhile, wealthy nations, would rather that the
developing world, but specifically China and to a lesser extent India,
agree to binding, verifiable CO2 cuts without the price tag.

The key advantage of the Copenhagen Accord for rich countries is that
it “weakens or even does away with the principle of common but
differentiated responsibilities,” as the South Centre, a Geneva-based
think-tank close to developing world governments, warns – another
reason why the Basic countries, upon reflection, have taken a distance
from the deal.

In many ways, Copenhagen was a victory for the developing world, in
that it managed to hold off against pressure to junk the Kyoto
Protocol and in the end ensured that the Copenhagen Accord was only
“noted” by the UN plenary instead of endorsed, making it a document
floating in a legal limbo.

Border tariff:

It should also be remembered that many other major powers were
sidelined at Copenhagen. Japan and Russia were also absent from
Copenhagen’s endgame. In many ways, the EU’s limited influence has
been largely a product of its own climate success. Although Europe is
the world’s third largest emitter, this will likely change in the near
future. Ironically, if the continent isn’t going to be as much of a
problem in absolute (as opposed to per capita) terms as China or India
by 2030, it doesn’t have much of a bargaining chip. Washington was
always going to be far more interested in Beijing.

Copenhagen was very much the US and China show, but it won’t always be.

——–

This feature was originially written for the Nordic Council’s Analys
Norden website.

{ We wonder at the last sentence of the article because we think that unless the EU does in fact unite under  one leadership it will not amount to much when the US continues to deal with the BASICs – I mean the countries that are form the basic future. The EU should aim at becoming the G3 to be added to China and the US in future global negotiations that will include also the IBSA and one or two more states. See please next article.}

——————————————————————————-

US blames Lisbon Treaty for EU summit fiasco. Mr Obama – the Madrid summit decision is being seen as a diplomatic snub to Spain.
by ANDREW RETTMAN from Brussels.

February 3, 2010, http://euobserver.com/9/29398/?rk=1
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS  writes -  The US State Department has said that President Barack Obama’s decision not to come to an EU summit in Madrid in May is partly due to confusion arising from the Lisbon Treaty.

State department spokesman Philip J. Crowley told press in Washington on Tuesday (2 February) that the treaty has made it unclear who the US leader should meet and when. { that sounds very clear to me.}

“Up until recently, they [summits] would occur on six-month intervals,
as I recall, with one meeting in Europe and one meeting here. And that
was part of – the foundation of that was the rotating presidency
within the EU. Now you have a new structure regarding not only the
rotating EU presidency, you’ve got an EU Council president, you’ve got
a European Commission president,” he said.

“We are working through this just as Europeans themselves are working
through this: When you have a future EU-US summit meeting, who will
host it and where will it be held?” he added. “All of this is kind of
being reassessed in light of architectural changes in Europe.”

The Lisbon Treaty came into force on 1 December, 2009. It created the post
of a new EU Council president and EU foreign relations chief in order
to give the union a stronger voice abroad.

It kept the institution of the six-month rotating EU presidency as
well, with the member state holding the chairmanship to do the bulk of
behind-the-scenes policy work in Brussels.

The Spanish EU presidency is being closely watched to see how the EU
manages the transition to the new power structure. The EU Council
president has so far taken charge of summits in the EU capital. But
Madrid was to share the limelight with a few top-level events at home.

The state department’s Mr Crowley said the US and Spain have been in
touch “directly” to discuss Mr Obama’s decision after Madrid learned
about it through the media on Monday.

“Obviously, there’s been some disappointment expressed by the
government of Spain, and we understand that and we’ll be working with
them on that,” he said.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero and Mr Obama are both
expected to attend the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington on
Thursday. But no bilateral meeting has been announced so far.

Mr Zapatero, a centre-left secularist, has taken flak for his trip in
Spanish media, with the El Pais daily calling his decision to attend
the prayer event “shocking.”

The kernel of the future – the projected five world leaders – are in trouble. With the US and China in a tiff because of Taiwan (arm sales by US manufacturers) and Tibet (a visit with the Dalai Lama), now South Africa, one of the three IBSAs that met with the G2 in Copenhagen, shows sings of 21st century immaturity. You just cannot go on living by Zulu rules if you want to lead your people out of poverty. Tiger Woods learned that very very fast that the limelight of world media will do you in, and even oil rich monarchs do not father now 20 children anymore. The stories about Zuma’s ascent in South Africa were plenty and his people we know told us so when it was rumored that he is in line to take over his country’s helm. It seems that Mandela’s South Africa deserves better – so does the 15 States group of Southern Africa { http://www.sadc.int }, and black Sub-Sahara Africa at large. We said before, South Africa is the third IBSA not alone, but as the symbol of all that immense Sub-Sahara black chunk of resources rich land and its one billion people that have the potential of evolving into next great consumers market to drive their own economy and the world economy. To this mass of people, the South African President must be an example and our prejudice that we knowingly attempt to show by this posting, calls for an exemplary leader for South Africa – someone fit to try on Mandela’s shoes.

This week the African Union rejected the attempt of Libya’s rambling Gaddafi to hold on to the chairmanship of Africa for another year, and voted instead to give the position to Malawi President Bingu wa Mutharika. We attach the story about that event at the end of this posting, as we focus on the further ramblings by a Libyan-sponsored group of African traditional leaders from an unnamed French speaking African country, who crowned Qaddafi “King of Kings.” Africa seems to react indeed with understanding to the fact that the world is changing into a 7 to 10 countries structure and that Africa wants one of its own, and that means not Qaddafi, to be part of this structure – a modern man rather then a traditional chieftain – neither do they think anymore that the position of leader in Addis Ababa belongs to a Mediterranean North African settler. They want a black leader – but hiding under a Zulu mantle, and invoking rules of the desert, simply  can not do anymore.

——————–
South Africa’s President Sows (Another) Sex Scandal.

Theunis Bates
 http://abbaymedia.com/News/?p=3699
By JASON McLURE

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the Libyan leader, delivered a rambling rebuke of fellow African heads of state Sunday after they chose to replace him as chairman of the African Union and failed to endorse his push for the creation of a United States of Africa.

“I do not believe we can achieve something concrete in the coming future,” said Colonel Qaddafi, before introducing President Bingu wa Mutharika of Malawi as his successor at the African Union’s annual summit meeting, held in Addis Ababa. “The political elite of our continent lacks political awareness and political determination. The world is changing into 7 or 10 countries, and we are not even aware of it.”

South Africa, Ethiopia and Nigeria were among the countries opposing Colonel Qaddafi’s attempts to form a continental government, which many view as impractical given the political and economic disparities in Africa.

Colonel Qaddafi argued that individual African states are too weak to negotiate with major powers like the European Union, the United States and China. His efforts to become the first African leader to win another one-year term as chairman of the African Union were thwarted by a push for Mr. Mutharika, 75, by the 15-member Southern African Development Community.

The Libyan leader also complained that such summit meetings were boring, that his colleagues were too long-winded and that he often was not informed of African Union decisions.

Colonel Qaddafi did not leave the lectern before giving the microphone to an unnamed representative of a Libyan-sponsored group of African traditional leaders who had crowned him “King of Kings” in a ceremony in 2008.

The representative, bearing a golden scepter and trailed by an aide fanning him with a large feather, spent much of his address praising Colonel Qaddafi.

“You have the African people with you,” said the man, who spoke in French and did not identify himself. “This is what is important, not politicking. It is politicians who have destroyed us.”

From Kim Coetze

You are invited to apply to attend the conference: “PUTTING A PRICE ON CARBON: Economic instruments to mitigate climate change in South Africa and other developing countries” to be held at the University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa on 23 and 24 March 2010.

The objectives of this conference are to:
* Build on discussions undertaken at a side-event and a workshop at the Climate Change Summit 2009
* Contribute to the development of climate policy in South Africa, by further exploring practical options for putting a price on carbon,
* Deepen the understanding of economic instruments, through a conference with peer-reviewed papers,
* Broaden the community of experts working in this emerging field, by having attracted papers from researchers and analysts in cognate disciplines that are not currently working on carbon pricing
* including economics and environmental economics, but also
* researchers working on institutional and political dimensions
* Draw on experiences and lessons from other countries, in particular
* other developing countries in their exploration of the same issues in similar contexts, and
* experiences of implementation in developed countries examining the applicability in the context of development.

Further details can be found on the conference website – a link to which is on the ERC website http://www.erc.uct.ac.za. Or direct queries to Meagan Jooste at  erc-climatechange at uct.ac.za.
Participation is free, but no costs will be covered.

Regards,
Kim Coetzee
Energy Research Centre
University of Cape Town

Ranjit Devraj writes for IPS Terra Viva at the UN that the BASIC Group meeting concluded with an amazing – ‘Copenhagen Accord Not Legal, Kyoto Protocol Is.’ Nevertheless Brazil, South Africa, India and China – will submit their plans for voluntary mitigation actions by the Jan. 31, 2010 deadline stipulated by the Copenhagen Accord. That amounts to positive participation and denying it also.
 http://ipsterraviva.net/UN/currentNew.as…

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 2010

‘Copenhagen Accord Not Legal, Kyoto Protocol Is’
Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Jan 26 (IPS) – While the BASIC bloc countries – Brazil, South Africa, India and China – will submit their plans for voluntary mitigation actions by the Jan. 31 deadline stipulated by the Copenhagen Accord, they have taken care to emphasise that the agreement, reached at the end of the December climate change summit in the Danish capital, has no legal basis.

Addressing a joint press conference after a meeting of concerned BASIC ministers on Sunday, India’s environment minister Jairam Ramesh said: “We support the Copenhagen Accord. But all of us were unanimously of the view that its value lies not as a standalone document but as an input into the two- track negotiation process under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).”

Ramesh explained that the Accord was not a legal document and that the “understanding reached at Copenhagen was that the accord will facilitate the two-track negotiating process which is the only legitimate process to reach a legally binding treaty in Mexico.” The two-track negotiation process was agreed upon at the December 2007 Bali conference, pertaining to Long-Term Cooperative Action under the UNFCCC and the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.

The BASIC meeting and the press conference were attended by Carlos Minc, the Brazilian environment minister, his counterpart from South Africa, Buyelwa Sonjica, and the vice-chairman of China’s National Development and Reform Commission, Xie Zhenhua.

At the press conference, Xie said that the BASIC group’s objectives were consistent with the interests of the developing countries. “BASIC will take the lead in large-scale emission reduction and also stick to the policy of common but differentiated principle.” Sonjica said BASIC would not make any decision outside the Group of 77 (G-77) countries. “We see ourselves as adding value to the proposals of G-77,” she said.

Siddharth Pathak, a member of the international environmental group Greenpeace’s policy division, told IPS that the willingness of the BASIC group to support vulnerable countries by ensuring their participation in open and transparent negotiations and plans to provide technological and financial support was commendable. “We hope that this support will become tangible by the group’s next meeting in April.”

Pathak said that while BASIC appeared keen to consolidate itself as a group and also take along the G-77 countries, it needed to “demonstrate leadership, both in furthering negotiations on a fair, ambitious and legally binding agreement, and in terms of pushing industrialised counties to urgently reduce GhG (greenhouse gas) emissions and make their own appropriate contributions.”

Other analysts said the BASIC meeting had the potential of cementing differences both within and outside the bloc.

“What is crucial now is to see whether China and India will stick to carbon intensity figures in their action plans, as they announced before the Copenhagen meet,” said Siddharth Mishra, director at CUTS International, a leading economic policy and advocacy group. Carbon intensity is a measure of carbon dioxide emissions per unit of production.

“This will suit China well because it is already on a trajectory of lowering its energy intensity and it has voluntarily announced cuts of 40-45 percent before Copenhagen,” said Mitra. “India, too, can reduce the trend of the growth of its emissions and specify domestic regulations to ensure reductions in emissions from its dirty industries,” Mitra told IPS.

Mitra added: “We don’t know what the back-of-the-envelope calculations are, but both China and India may benefit from the pledge of 100 billion U.S. dollars by the end of the decade for developing countries to adapt to climate change and limit the global rise in temperatures, since industrialisation began, from exceeding two degrees Celsius.”

Denmark, as president of the Conference of Parties (CoP), has been asked by the BASIC ministers to convene immediately meetings of the two negotiation groups for the Kyoto Protocol and the Long-Term Cooperative Action in March and ensure that they meet on at least five more occasions before the 16th CoP in December.

After the BASIC countries joined hands with the United States in negotiating the Copenhagen Accord, at the end of the summit in the Danish capital, several developing countries expressed fears that the document would become legal and dilute the Bali two-track process.

BASIC ministers have also asked the rich nations to speedily distribute the 10 billion dollars they had pledged to the least developed countries and the islands to address climate change this year.

Brazil’s Minc said at the press conference that BASIC had decided to create its own fund to help small island states and the least developed countries. “The actual contributions will be decided at the next meeting of the BASIC in South Africa,” he said.

A day before the BASIC meet, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh let it be known that he had reservations over pressure from Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon for follow-up action on the Copenhagen Accord and get results by the Jan. 31 deadline.

While the Accord had called for “economy-wide emission targets” by 2020 by the Annex-1 (rich countries) and the other countries to submit “mitigation actions,” Rasmussen and Ban had written separately to all heads of state and governments on Dec. 30, urging them to submit their commitments by Jan. 31.

Their joint letter was silent on the Kyoto Protocol, raising suspicions. Mitra said that such suspicions first surfaced after the UNFCCC executive secretary, Yvo de Boer, failed to mention the Kyoto Protocol at a press conference held soon after the Copenhagen Accord. “The impression that there is a plan afoot to bury Kyoto is not helped by the fact that the European Union is pushing it as a first step to new negotiations.”

The Kyoto Protocol, the world’s only legally binding agreement, required 37 wealthy nations to cut GhG emissions by 2012, but asked for no commitments from developing countries. In contrast, the Copenhagen Accord does not talk of mitigation goals for the developed countries and is seen to be acting to lower the bar in climate negotiations when scientists warn that the climate is changing more rapidly than estimated earlier.

The Accord was opposed by Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, Nicaragua and Sudan on both substantive and procedural grounds. For that reason, it could not be accepted or endorsed by the CoP, which only “took note” of it, denying the document status at the U.N.

In an editorial on Tuesday, the respected ‘The Hindu’ newspaper commented that the response of BASIC “underscores the view of the developing world that the Copenhagen Accord chose to give insufficient importance to the central tenet of “common but differentiated responsibilities” outlined in the UNFCCC.

The Hindu editorial said one positive outcome of the “common strategy” adopted by BASIC countries was the fostering of “active South-South cooperation” to advance science. “Given that intellectual property rights on technology remain a major barrier to achieving higher energy efficiencies, such joint efforts involving India and China hold great promise.”

Two Great Articles in the LIFE & ARTS Section of the Martin Luther King Weekend’s Financial Times.

They are about the BRICS (Brazil, India, China, and South Africa) Economies that we keep on our website on the separate buttons for Russia and the IBSA (India, Brazil, and South Africa.

The Term Brics or BRICS was coined in 2001 by Jim O’Neill of Goldman Sachs who by the end of the first decade of the 21st century also spoke about a lost decade – but the decade was not lost by everybody – See how O’Neil’s idea did not colapse as the credit crisis hit – actually the Brics emerged relatively well from it and can thus continue their strive for greater development.

The article about the Moscow formerly domesticated dog’s return to a semi-status of human dependent wolfs hit us as another example of strive to sustainability. The Muscovite’s respect for these animals embodying a mutual relationship that can be viewed also in terms of the evolution of the power of the BRICS. We just posted the article that Brazil can be expected to take on a leading position after the Haiti catastrophe. The US can be expected to be more and more in a special relationship with the IBSA and, as we wrote about it earlier – the EU might some day include also Russia as one of its top tier members.

————–
 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/112ca932-00ab-…

The story of the Brics.
By Gillian Tett
Published: January 15 2010 17:01 | Last updated: January 15 2010 17:01

On the desk of Jim O’Neill, chief economist for Goldman Sachs, stand four flimsy flags. They look out of place among the expensive computer terminals of the investment bank’s plush London office, like leftovers of a child’s geography homework or cheap mementos from backpacking trips to exotic parts of the world. But these flags hint at a more interesting story – of the latest way in which money and ideas are reshaping the world. The small scraps of fabric are pennants for big countries: Brazil, Russia, India and China. And almost a decade ago, O’Neill decided to start thinking of them as a group – which he gave the acronym Bric.

It was a simple mental prop. The bolder move was to predict – publicly, and in Goldman’s name – that by 2041 (later revised to 2039, then 2032) the Brics would overtake the six largest western economies in terms of economic might. The four flags would come to represent the pillars of the 21st-century economy.

At the time, many scoffed at this idea. The predictions turned conventional western wisdom on its head; and O’Neill hardly seemed an obvious champion of the concept. A large man with working-class Manchester roots, he does not exude the aura of any globetrotting elite. His office is decorated with splashes of cherry red memorabilia from Manchester United Football Club, and he still speaks with the thick, flattened vowels of his childhood. Indeed, when O’Neill coined the term Bric in 2001, he had never properly visited three of the four countries (the exception was China), and spoke none of their languages. Yet, notwithstanding those unlikely beginnings, in the past decade, Bric has become a near ubiquitous financial term, shaping how a generation of investors, financiers and policymakers view the emerging markets: companies ranging from Nissan to media group WPP have developed Brics business strategies; several dozen financial institutions now run Brics funds; business schools have launched Brics courses; and this April Phillips de Pury will be holding a Brics-themed auction. “The Brics concept … that O’Neill created … has become such a strong brand,” says Felipe Góes, adviser to the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, who is organising the first Brics think-tank.

O’Neill speaks in smaller spheres for a moment: “It has transformed my life,” he says.

To some critics, the fuss about Brics is overblown. The term is hype, spin, from a bank and banking industry accustomed to disguising such guff as genuinely new ideas and concepts – the better to profit from them. “Brics is really just marketing – it’s nonsense!” says Charles Dumas, a London-based economist who disputes many elements of the Brics concept, such as the idea that these countries will keep growing inexorably into the future. Others are more cynical still, arguing that Goldmans Sachs has used the concept to extend its global power, and thus turbo-charge its formidable profit-making machine. O’Neill denies this latter accusation. “I really believe in this idea of Brics, that this idea can make the world a better place – it’s what drives me,” he says.

But even if Brics is self-interested spin, such spin – an idea in itself, really – can sometimes take on a life of its own, beyond what its creators expect or even hope for. By creating the word Brics, O’Neill has redrawn powerbrokers’ cognitive map, helping them to articulate a fundamental shift of influence away from the western world. And if you believe that the way humans think and speak not only reflects reality, but can shape its future path too, then this Brics tag has itself come both to reflect and drive the change – albeit from some unlikely beginnings.

……………………..

The rise of the non-western world

The way O’Neill, 52, tells the tale of how he developed the Brics – and he is a born raconteur – starts, a touch melodramatically, on the day terrorists flew aircraft into the World Trade Centre and Pentagon, killing thousands of people.

The son of a postman, O’Neill grew up in south Manchester, where he studied at the local comprehensive (Oasis’s Noel and Liam Gallagher were pupils there too, albeit later) and spent much of his time playing football. After school, he decided to study at Sheffield University, partly because it offered easy access to watch Manchester United. (Today, he has a season tickets at Old Trafford, and leaves spare tickets behind the bar at a local pub, for childhood friends to use.) During his time there, between “getting drunk and playing football”, O’Neill discovered a passion for economics. And after completing a doctorate in the subject, he worked as a foreign exchange analyst at a series of City banks, eventually joining Goldman in 1995 as co-head of economics. In the summer of 2001, Gavyn Davies, O’Neill’s highly respected co-chief, announced his departure – leaving O’Neill the sole leader, and under huge pressure to perform. “I thought: “Oh my god, I have got to put my imprint on this department,” he recalls. “I was searching for a theme and a new idea.”

“What 9/11 told me was that there was no way that globalisation was going to be Americanisation in the future – nor should it be. In order for globalisation to advance, it had to be accepted by more people … but not by imposing the dominant American social and philosophical beliefs and structures”
Inspiration came – a bittersweet gift. On September 11, as the first aircraft approached the Twin Towers, where he had delivered a lecture a few days earlier, O’Neill was hosting a global video conference call. Halfway through, the New York faces vanished from the screen. O’Neill later learnt the staff had been safely evacuated from their offices, but he still reeled in shock at the events. In the days that followed, his mind began to whir. As a foreign exchange analyst, O’Neill had always been a passionate advocate of globalisation, and was fascinated by the rising power of Asia. And to him, the horror in Manhattan was a powerful demonstration of exactly why the non-western world was starting to matter more and more – albeit in a negative way. However, O’Neill also believed – or hoped – that this shift in power could be seen in a more positive sense, too. “What 9/11 told me was that there was no way that globalisation was going to be Americanisation in the future – nor should it be,” he says. “In order for globalisation to advance, it had to be accepted by more people … but not by imposing the dominant American social and philosophical beliefs and structures.”
In practical terms, O’Neill decided, that meant economists had to look more closely at how non-western economies could wield more power in the future. As he scoured the globe, he became increasingly fascinated by four countries: Brazil, India, Russia and China. In one sense, the four seemed disparate, separated geographically and culturally; they had never acted as a bloc in any way, never conceived of themselves as a unit. Yet what they all shared in 2001 were large populations, underdeveloped economies and governments that appeared willing to embrace global markets and some elements of globalisation. To O’Neill, these characteristics made them natural sisters: they all had the potential for rapid future growth.

Excited, he tried to work out how to label this bunch. Since China was easily the largest, it made sense to put its name first. “Lloyd Blankfein [Goldman Sachs’s chief executive] always teases me about it – he says I should have called the group the Cribs,” O’Neill recalls. But O’Neill thought that a word linked to babies would seem patronising. So on November 30 2001, he launched his Big Idea: Goldman Sachs’s Global Economic Paper #66, “Building Better Global Economic Brics”. He predicted, soberly, that “over the next 10 years, the weight of the Brics and especially China in world GDP will grow” – and warned, perhaps a little less soberly, that “in line with these prospects, world policymaking forums should be reorganised” to give more power to the group he had now dubbed Brics.

……………………..

Welcome to Briclife

The paper immediately sparked interest among Goldman Sachs’s corporate clients, particularly those already selling – or trying to sell – consumer products to the emerging markets. “I found the Bric thing fascinating right from the start,” says Martin Sorrell, chief executive of WPP. “It tapped into what we had been already discussing.” But to many investors and bankers – including some inside Goldman Sachs – it all seemed rather fanciful, particularly given that countries such as Brazil had recently experienced hyperinflation. “When I first spoke at a big group in Rio [after the paper was published], it was to around 1,000 investors from all of Latin America,” recalls O’Neill. “The guy who was introducing me whispered in my ear as he went to the podium, ‘we all know that the only reason the B is there is because without it there is no acronym.’”

But O’Neill kept discussing the concept with colleagues and in 2003 his team produced the next offering: a paper called “Dreaming with Brics: The Path to 2050”. It boldly declared that by 2039 the Brics group could overtake the largest western economies in scale. “The list of the world’s 10 largest economies may look quite different in 2050,” it said. That prediction launched O’Neill’s team into what he calls Briclife. Within days, Goldman economists were flooded with e-mails from executives at companies ranging from mobile telecoms group Vodafone to miner BHP Billiton to Ikea and Nissan. By luck – or insight – O’Neill had produced this tag just as many western businesses were trying to hone their strategies to sell products to the non-western world, or to use regions such as China as a manufacturing base. And in a world where corporate boards face information overload, Brics suddenly provided executives with a snappy way of discussing strategy. Better still, unlike phrases such as “emerging markets” or “developing world”, Brics did not sound patronising, or unpromising; it was neutral, strong, politically correct.

Soon rivals, such as HSBC and Deutsche Bank fund unit DWS, were launching dedicated investment funds marketed under the label of Brics. “We asked our lawyers if we could trademark the word Brics, but they said not – apparently it’s not a product,” O’Neill recalls. Steadily, the brand spread, taking on a life beyond Goldman. Initially, most hedge funds ignored the concept as marketing hype. But as investors began to purchase assets specifically linked to the rise of Brics, the hedge-funders recognised that the way that China, say, was making cars could affect demand for Brazilian copper. New correlations were developing in asset prices, amid strong investment flows (since 2003, the Brics stock markets have risen from 2 to 9 per cent of global market capitalisation, and O’Neill forecasts they will represent almost 50 per cent of global market capitalisation in 2050).

……………………..

Who’s in, who’s out?

Unsurprisingly, O’Neill’s rivals started to snipe. Some economists said it was ridiculous to make forecasts as far out as 2050, particularly since many of O’Neill’s projections seemed to involve extrapolating current growth on a straight line. Others took issue with the idea that the four Bric countries could – or should – be described as a group. “Economically, financially and politically, China overshadows and will continue to overshadow the other Brics,” analysts at Deutsche Bank argued. Some banks tried to ban their employees from using the B word. “Why the hell should we do Goldman’s marketing for it?” says the chief executive of one of the world’s biggest investment banks. Meanwhile, out in the market, some investors suggested it would be better to talk about Bricks (with Korea included), or Brimck (with Mexico as well) or even Abrimcks (chucking in the Arab region and South Africa). One market wag joked that somebody should start trading the Cement bloc (Countries Excluded from the Emerging New Terminology).

O’Neill fought back. The Goldman team started to crank out Bric research, looking at everything from the future size of the Indian middle class to car use in Brazil. In an effort to soothe some ruffled feathers, in 2005 O’Neill tried to explain why Korea and Mexico had not been included in his big idea (the rather arbitrary-sounding reason was that they were members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). He also tried to placate some of the non-Brics by offering a new term: the “N-11”, or Next Eleven nations on the list to emerge as powers. This was a confusingly broad club, encompassing Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Korea, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam, but within months companies such as Nissan and WPP were bandying “N-11” around their boardrooms. Another marketing tag – or boundary on a cognitive map – had been born.

Nor was it just the corporate world getting excited. O’Neill heard that politicians in Nigeria were slapping the term on their internal propaganda campaigns, redefining some of the slogans for their own ends; it was uncannily reminiscent of how 19th-century Nigerians once transposed the language of the Anglican Church to their own cultural traditions.

……………………..

The Teflon term

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of O’Neill’s golden child is what it didn’t do: collapse under scrutiny as the credit crisis hit. Over the past two years, many of Wall Street’s big ideas have been exposed as woefully ill-conceived at best, utterly fallacious at worst. However, during the great re-reckoning, the Brics concept has flourished. Most of the Brics and N-11 emerged from the crisis well, relative to the economies of the western world. Their banking systems are intact, and their economies are growing at breakneck speed. “As a result,” wrote O’Neill in a recent paper, “we think our long-term 2050 Bric ‘dream’ projections are more, rather than less, likely to materialise.” More specifically, Goldman now predicts that China’s economy will become as big as the US’s by 2027, while the total Brics group will eclipse the big western economies by 2032 – almost a decade sooner than first thought.

That, O’Neill argues, will overturn many western assumptions about how the world works. These days, Goldman aggressively recommends that investors decide which western companies to invest in based on whether they are selling to the Brics and N-11, rather than just western consumers. (In another piece of neat cultural transposition, Goldman recently dubbed this strategy “investment in the Brics Nifty 50” [companies which sell to the Brics region] – a reference to the “nifty 50” of big western companies that were beloved by investors back in the 1970s, when it was presumed that the US and Europe would provide the engines of growth.) “We estimate that two billion people could join the global middle-class by 2030, mainly from Brics,” Goldman’s latest research note trills.

The argument is beloved by some investors. “Had you heeded O’Neill’s work and gotten invested in the stock markets of those four nations [back in 2001], you’d have made more money this past decade than by doing virtually anything else conceivable,” declared Joshua Brown, an influential investment commentator, on his Wall Street blog last month. (O’Neill brushes off the praise as “somewhat embarrassing”.) Others fear it is the next big bubble. To some, the exclusion of countries such as South Africa – or even Indonesia – looks increasingly odd. And the inclusion of Russia is presenting an ever-greater headache, given that the Russian economy was the one Bric to take a real fall in the credit crisis – so severe, in fact, that some investors (and even a few bankers inside Goldman) suspect it is now time to kick Russia out of the group.

Unsurprisingly, O’Neill is reluctant to undermine Goldman’s relations with Moscow by doing that. Although he admits that Russia has “disappointed”, he also insists that if the country “recovers strongly and quickly in 2010 and 2011, as we expect, we believe it will deserve its Bric status”.

……………………..

Back to reality

In the early years of Bric-dom, the four countries chosen by O’Neill had reactions ranging from bafflement to indifference. But soon the countries began to embrace the designation, and use it to get their voices heard on the world stage
But now another Brics-related phenomenon is emerging. In the early years of Bric-dom, the four countries chosen by O’Neill had different reactions to the designation. There was delight in Russia, bafflement in China, cynicism in Brazil and indifference in India. Now, the countries are using the idea to forge tentative links in reality – not just the world of investment ideas. In May 2008, Russia hosted the first formal Bric summit, a meeting of Bric foreign ministers in Yekaterinburg. In July 2009, it followed this with a formal gathering of all four Bric heads of state.
As meetings go, these were symbolic, not substantive. Although the four countries discussed how they could better co-ordinate their affairs to gain greater influence – and seek alternatives to the dollar – they did not agree any tangible steps. But this year in the early summer, the four countries will meet again, this time in Brazil. In anticipation, the Brazilian authorities are establishing a group of academics and a formal think-tank to brainstorm how to develop the Brics agenda. As part of that, they plan to host a conference next month in Rio – with the participation of O’Neill himself. McKinsey, which has used a version of the Brics concept in its consulting strategy, will also be involved.

It might seem ironic that the four countries would choose a term created by an American bank to define themselves but it is not unprecedented. When countries such as India first developed their sense of national identity and rebelled against the British – or when Soviet republics such as Uzbekistan developed a similar nationalism – they did so using the borders that had also been imposed, artificially and arbitrarily, by an outside power. When the cognitive map is redrawn by a dominant power – even in the world of marketing and investment bank “spin” – it tends not to be erased so much as appropriated.

“Is there much evidence that the Brics countries are collaborating today in practical terms?” O’Neill asks. “Not really, no. But that could change in the future – you look at how Brazil supplies commodities which China needs … or the fact that they all have quite similar ideas about how to manage their economies.”

Or as Felipe Góes, the Brazilian official in Rio charged with setting up the world’s first Brics think-tank, says: “It is somewhat ironic [that we use the word Brics] … but that reflects the fact that in the modern world it is people like Goldman Sachs and McKinsey who have the resources and minds to develop ideas.” Indeed, what makes a large institution such as Goldman so influential these days is not simply its trading acumen and political connections, but also its ability to invest heavily in what bankers sometimes call “thought-leadership”, by funding analysis and ensuring it is read around the world.

……………………..

At home abroad

Back in New York, some of Goldman’s older managers are aware of the cultural ironies of the Brics boom. During the first 120 years of its history, Goldman made most of its profits from American markets, and today the firm is often viewed as the most politically well-connected of the US banks. If you step into the office of its headquarters at 85 Broad Street, in downtown Manhattan, the first thing that you see is a vast American flag, looming over the dull brown marble lobby. Yet appearances can deceive. While O’Neill has spent the past decade trying to carve out his own intellectual niche by promoting the Brics, so too – far more discreetly – Goldman has been remaking itself, building activities outside the American heartland to capture the growth that O’Neill forecasts. In the past decade, the bank has opened more offices across the world than in the whole of its previous history, and while revenues from the Americas accounted for 60 per cent of its earnings 10 years ago, they now represent about half (and far less if Latin America is excluded). Indeed, senior Goldman executives expect that within a few years, profits that are “made in America” will be a minority of total earnings.

That pattern is certainly not unique to Goldman Sachs: most other western banks have also been expanding across the globe in the past few years. Deutsche Bank, for example, has been deftly building an emerging markets derivatives franchise, while HSBC is now so convinced that its future lies in Asia that Michael Geoghegan, chief executive, recently relocated to Hong Kong from London.

Still, the swing is particularly striking at Goldman, given its all-American past. These days, one of the buzzwords at 85 Broad Street is “domestification”, or the idea that the bank must build businesses around the world that provide local clients not simply with international services, but also with services in their local markets. Rather than treating non-western countries as far-flung frontiers or pawns in a trading game, the new corporate rhetoric insists that the Brics (and other non-western countries) are markets in their own rights. Thus in Brazil, Goldman recently started selling Brazilian investment funds to Brazilians. In Japan, there are staff who speak barely speak a word of English. And in China – where Goldman Sachs most certainly does not fly a big US flag – the bank is sponsoring a Chinese business school, to ensure access to a stream of authentically local Chinese students.

This drive is going hand in hand with a complex process of cultural engineering. As the bank acquires more non-western staff, it is devising programmes to rotate its locally hired employees through headquarters, to ensure that they learn “Goldman values”. It also takes care to send staff from New York and London out to the regions, and to shuffle different ethnic groups between different regions.

As its sponsorship of Chinese business schools shows, Goldman is trying to raise a new generation of local leaders. “If you look at the history of the London office of Goldman, you can see how over a decade or two, you can have locals rise to the top,” says one top executive. “That is our goal across the world. The idea is to get embedded, to show that we are there for the long term … but also to ensure that our Goldman values are everywhere in the world.”

It all might sound reminiscent of the way the British empire operated in the 19th century – or the way the Russian Communist party once tried to knit the diverse peoples of the Soviet Union into a single ideologically based nation. Only this time, it is MBA programmes and Goldman training courses, rather than British public schools or communist training camps, that provide the cultural glue. And – perhaps most important of all – Goldman Sachs (unlike earlier empires) is not overtly acting with a nationalist or political agenda; insofar as it has a real loyalty, it is to its own bottom line and its ability to make profits.

Put it another way: Goldman will keep flying Old Glory only as long as it believes that there is profit to be made under that banner. No wonder a senior member of the US government remarked a couple of years ago, partly in jest, that sooner or later, Goldman “is going to have to choose whether it wants to really be American or not”. If O’Neill is even half-right in his predictions, it may not be a straightforward choice.

——————-

Gillian Tett is the FT’s capital markets editor.

Her last piece for the magazine was about the JP Morgan bankers who invented the credit derivative’ – and their reactions to the derivatives-induced financial crisis. Read it at www.ft.com

On Monday, the FT begins a five-part series on Bric consumers – who they are, what they buy, who is selling to them and what their rise means for the global economy

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 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/628a8500-ff1c-…

Moscow’s stray dogs
By Susanne Sternthal
Published in the Financial Times -  January 16 2010.

Russians can go nutty when it comes to dogs. Consider the incident a few years ago that involved Yulia Romanova, a 22-year-old model. On a winter evening, Romanova was returning with her beloved Staffordshire terrier from a visit to a designer who specialises in kitting out canine Muscovites in the latest fashions. The terrier was sporting a new green camouflage jacket as he walked with his owner through the crowded Mendeleyevskaya metro station. There they encountered Malchik, a black stray who had made the station his home, guarding it against drunks and other dogs. Malchik barked at the pair, defending his territory. But instead of walking away, Romanova reached into her pink rucksack, pulled out a kitchen knife and, in front of rush-hour commuters, stabbed Malchik to death.

{Photo – The statue of Malchik erected by well-wishers after his death.}
Romanova was arrested, tried and underwent a year of psychiatric treatment. Typically for Russia, this horror story was countered by a wellspring of sympathy for Moscow’s strays. A bronze statue of Malchik, paid for by donations, now stands at the entrance of Mendeleyevskaya station. It has become a symbol for the 35,000 stray dogs that roam Russia’s capital – about 84 dogs per square mile. You see them everywhere. They lie around in the courtyards of apartment complexes, wander near markets and kiosks, and sleep inside metro stations and pedestrian passageways. You can hear them barking and howling at night. And the strays on Moscow’s streets do not look anything like the purebreds preferred by status-conscious Muscovites. They look like a breed apart.
I moved to Moscow with my family last year and was startled to see so many stray dogs. Watching them over time, I realised that, despite some variation in colour – some were black, others yellowish white or russet – they all shared a certain look. They were medium-sized with thick fur, wedge-shaped heads and almond eyes. Their tails were long and their ears erect.

They also acted differently. Every so often, you would see one waiting on a metro platform. When the train pulled up, the dog would step in, scramble up to lie on a seat or sit on the floor if the carriage was crowded, and then exit a few stops later. There is even a website dedicated to the metro stray (www.metrodog.ru) on which passengers post photos and video clips taken with their mobile phones, documenting the savviest of the pack using the public transport system like any other Muscovite.

Where did these animals come from? It’s a question Andrei Poyarkov, 56, a biologist specialising in wolves, has dedicated himself to answering. His research focuses on how different environments affect dogs’ behaviour and social organisation. About 30 years ago, he began studying Moscow’s stray dogs. Poyarkov contends that their appearance and behaviour have changed over the decades as they have continuously adapted to the changing face of Russia’s capital. Virtually all the city’s strays were born that way: dumping a pet dog on the streets of Moscow amounts to a near-certain death sentence. Poyarkov reckons fewer than 3 per cent survive.

. . .

Poyarkov works at the A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution in south-west Moscow. His office is small, but boasts high ceilings and tall windows. Several wire cages sit on a table in the centre of the room. Inside them, four weasels scurry through tunnels and run on a wheel. Poyarkov and I sit near the weasels and sip green tea.

Biologist Andrei Poyarkov – He first thought of observing the behaviour of stray dogs in 1979, and began with the ones that lived near his apartment and those he encountered on his way to work. The area he studied came to comprise some 10 sq km, home to about 100 dogs. Poyarkov started making recordings of the sounds that the strays made, and began to study their social organisation. He photographed and catalogued them, mapping where each dog lived.
He quickly found that the strays were much easier to study than wolves. “To see a wild wolf is a real event,” he says. “You can see them, but not for very long and not at close range. But with stray dogs you can watch them for as long as you want and, for the most part, be quite near them.” According to Poyarkov, there are 30,000 to 35,000 stray dogs in Moscow, while the wolf population for the whole of Russia is about 50,000 to 60,000. Population density, he says, determines how frequently the animals come into contact with each other, which in turn affects their behaviour, psychology, stress levels, physiology and relationship to their environment.

“The second difference between stray dogs and wolves is that the dogs, on average, are much less aggressive and a good deal more tolerant of one another,” says Poyarkov. Wolves stay strictly within their own pack, even if they share a territory with another. A pack of dogs, however, can hold a dominant position over other packs and their leader will often “patrol” the other packs by moving in and out of them. His observations have led Poyarkov to conclude that this leader is not necessarily the strongest or most dominant dog, but the most intelligent – and is acknowledged as such. The pack depends on him for its survival.

Moscow’s strays sit somewhere between house pets and wolves, says Poyarkov, but are in the early stages of the shift from the domesticated back towards the wild. That said, there seems little chance of reversing this process. It is virtually impossible to domesticate a stray: many cannot stand being confined indoors.

“Genetically, wolves and dogs are almost identical,” says Poyarkov. “What has changed significantly [with domestication] is a range of hormonal and behavioural parameters, because of the brutal natural selection that eliminated many aggressive animals.” He recounts the work of Soviet biologist Dmitri Belyaev, exiled from Moscow in 1948 during the Stalin years for a commitment to classical genetics that ran counter to state scientific doctrine of the time.

Under the guise of studying animal physiology, Belyaev set up a Russian silver fox research centre in Novosibirsk, setting out to test his theory that the most important selected characteristic for the domestication of dogs was a lack of aggression. He began to select foxes that showed the least fear of humans and bred them. After 10-15 years, the foxes he bred showed affection to their keepers, even licking them. They barked, had floppy ears and wagged their tails. They also developed spotted coats – a surprising development that was connected with a decrease in their levels of adrenaline, which shares a biochemical pathway with melanin and controls pigment production.

“With stray dogs, we’re witnessing a move backwards,” explains Poyarkov. “That is, to a wilder and less domesticated state, to a more ‘natural’ state.” As if to prove his point, strays do not have spotted coats, they rarely wag their tails and are wary of humans, showing no signs of affection towards them.

. . .

The stray dogs of Moscow are mentioned for the first time in the reports of the journalist and writer Vladimir Gilyarovsky in the latter half of the 19th century. But Poyarkov says they have been there as long as the city itself. They remain different from wolves, in particular because they exhibit pronounced “polymorphism” – a range of behavioural traits shaped in part by the “ecological niche” they occupy. And it is this ability to adapt that explains why the population density of strays is so much greater than that of wolves. “With several niches there are more resources and more opportunities.”

The dogs divide into four types, he says, which are determined by their character, how they forage for food, their level of socialisation to people and the ecological niche they inhabit.

{Photo: A dog seeking warmth near Moscow’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.}
Those that remain most comfortable with people Poyarkov calls “guard dogs”. Their territories tend to be garages, warehouses, hospitals and other fenced-in institutions, and they develop ties to the security guards from whom they receive food and whom they regard as masters. I’ve seen them in my neighbourhood near the front gate to the Central Clinical Hospital for Civil Aviation. When I pass on the other side with my dog they cross the street towards us, barking loudly.
“The second stage of becoming wild is where the dog is socialised to people in general, but not personally,” says Poyarkov. “These are the beggars and they are excellent psychologists.” He gives as an example a dog that appears to be dozing as throngs of people walk past, but who rears his head when an easy target comes into view: “The dog will come to a little old lady, start smiling and wagging his tail, and sure enough, he’ll get food.” These dogs not only smell who is carrying something tasty, but sense who will stop and feed them.

The beggars live in relatively small packs and are subordinate to leaders. If a dog is intelligent but occupies a low rank and does not get enough to eat, he will separate from the pack frequently to look for food. If he sees other dogs begging, he will watch and learn.

The third group comprises dogs that are somewhat socialised to people, but whose social interaction is directed almost exclusively towards other strays. Their main strategy for acquiring food is gathering scraps from the streets and the many open rubbish bins. During the Soviet period, the pickings were slim, which limited their population (as did a government policy of catching and killing them). But as Russia began to prosper in the post-Soviet years, official efforts to cull them fell away and, at the same time, many more choice offerings appeared in the bins. The strays flourished.

The last of Poyarkov’s groups are the wild dogs. “There are dogs living in the city that are not socialised to people. They know people, but view them as dangerous. Their range is extremely broad, and they are predators. They catch mice, rats and the occasional cat. They live in the city, but as a rule near industrial complexes, or in wooded parks. They are nocturnal and walk about when there are fewer people on the streets.”

My neighbourhood is in the north-west of Moscow and lies between a large wooded park and one of the canals of the Moscow river. Leaving the windows open once the thaw of spring finally took hold, I found myself pulled out of a deep slumber by a cacophony that sounded as if packs of dogs were tearing each other apart in the grounds of our apartment complex. This went on for weeks. I later learned that spring is when many strays mate – “the dog marriage season”, as Russians poetically call it.

. . .

There is one special sub-group of strays that stands apart from the rest: Moscow’s metro dogs. “The metro dog appeared for the simple reason that it was permitted to enter,” says Andrei Neuronov, an author and specialist in animal behaviour and psychology, who has worked with Vladimir Putin’s black female Labrador retriever, Connie (“a very nice pup”). “This began in the late 1980s during perestroika,” he says. “When more food appeared, people began to live better and feed strays.” The dogs started by riding on overground trams and buses, where supervisors were becoming increasingly thin on the ground.

Neuronov says there are some 500 strays that live in the metro stations, especially during the colder months, but only about 20 have learned how to ride the trains. This happened gradually, first as a way to broaden their territory. Later, it became a way of life. “Why should they go by foot if they can move around by public transport?” he asks.

“They orient themselves in a number of ways,” Neuronov adds. “They figure out where they are by smell, by recognising the name of the station from the recorded announcer’s voice and by time intervals. If, for example, you come every Monday and feed a dog, that dog will know when it’s Monday and the hour to expect you, based on their sense of time intervals from their biological clocks.”

The metro dog also has uncannily good instincts about people, happily greeting kindly passers by, but slinking down the furthest escalator to avoid the intolerant older women who oversee the metro’s electronic turnstiles. “Right outside this metro,” says Neuronov, gesturing toward Frunzenskaya station, a short distance from the park where we were speaking, “a black dog sleeps on a mat. He’s called Malish. And this is what I saw one day: a bowl of freshly ground beef set before him, and slowly, and ever so lazily, he scooped it up with his tongue while lying down.”

. . .

Stray dogs evoke a strong reaction from Muscovites. While the model Romanova’s stabbing of a stray demonstrated an example of one extreme, the statue erected in his memory depicts the other. The city government has been forced to take action to protect the strays, but with mixed results. In 2002, mayor Yuri Luzhkov enacted legislation forbidding the killing of stray animals and adopted a new strategy of sterilising them and building shelters.

But until Russians themselves adopt the practice of sterilising their pets, this will remain only a half-measure. One Russian, noting that my male Ridgeback is neutered, exclaimed: “Now, why would you want to cripple a dog in that way?” Even though the city budget allocated more than $30m to build 15 animal shelters last year, that is not nearly enough to accommodate the strays. Still, there is pressure from some quarters to return to the practice of catching and culling them. Poyarkov believes this would be dangerous. While the goal, he acknowledges, “is to do away with dogs who carry rabies, tapeworms, toxoplasmosis and other infections, what actually happens is that infected dogs and other animals outside Moscow will come into the city because the biological barrier maintained by the population of strays in Moscow is turned upside down. The environment becomes chaotic and unpredictable and the epidemiological situation worsens.”
Alexey Vereshchagin, 33, a graduate student who works with Poyarkov, says that Moscow probably could find a way of controlling the feared influx. But that doesn’t mean he thinks strays should be removed from the capital. “I grew up with them,” he says. “Personally, I think they make life in the city more interesting.” Like other experts, Vereshchagin questions whether strays could ever be eliminated completely, particularly given the city’s generally chaotic approach to administration.

Poyarkov concedes that sterilisation might control the number of strays, if methodically conducted. But his work suggests that the population is self-regulating anyway. The quantity of food available keeps the total steady at about 35,000 – Moscow strays are at the limit and, as a result, most pups born to strays don’t reach adulthood. “If they do survive, it is only to replace an adult dog that died,” Poyarkov says. Even then, their life expectancy seldom exceeds 10 years. Having spent a career studying the stray dogs of Moscow and tracing their path back towards a wilder state, he is in no hurry to see them swept from the streets.

“I am not at all convinced that Moscow should be left without dogs. Given a correct relationship to dogs, they definitely do clean the city. They keep the population of rats down. Why should the city be a concrete desert? Why should we do away with strays who have always lived next to us?”

————–
Susanne Sternthal is a writer living in Moscow

In Copenhagen, well meaning NGOs demanded the outlawing of internal flights because of the CO2 emissions air travel is causing. In effect air travel causes just as much GHG as automotive transportation, and until now air transport was not taken into account, and was not part of the content of the Kyoto Protocol to the UNFCCC. It was supposed to be picked up for the second stage of Kyoto, but as Kyoto has fallen by the wayside as of now, these discussions also led nowhere.

OK, we came back pleased with President Obama’s performance on the international negotiations on climate change. We followed with interest his trip to China and the State Visit of the Indian Head of State to the White House. We knew that the President is right in leading to some sort of agreement between the major emitters – China and the US – to be supported by next line of evolving strong economies – the IBSA. We know those three leaders met with China separately from the Obama trip to Beijing. An agreement between the emitters is clearly much more valuable then agreements between lesser emitters, and Kyoto is just the great tub that says there was no wash for ten years.

Now, let us be honest. With eight years of GW Bush/Cheney government very little has been achieved in emissions reduction by the US federal government, but some States imposed rules and even laws that caused people to start changing behavior. But that was not all – in effect the increase of price of oil led people to drive less and to move to smaller cars. I know that there are still Hummer affectionados even in New York City, but I also see tiny cars on the street, I know about hybrids that I dislike, but also of electric cars that are coming on the market very soon. Our website is following this closely. We just posted about “Better Place” and “Balqon.” Our postings on the metal Lithium that will be used in batteries are among the most read postings.

OK – so money saving talks to people. But not just money – think also of convenience. In the 1970’s when people were scared of shortages in fuel, they changed to CNG and moved to more efficient vehicles – but they also wanted electric cars, hoping that if they lived in a suburb they will be able to “refuel” in their own garrage at home, without ever having to visit a supplier. The automotive industry killed that early thought because they make one third of their profit from parts and repairs – and their horror dreams – electric motors have no moving parts and need no repair.

People think nothing of taking a taxi to the airport and catching a flight – but thanks to our enemies we will have now to spend three and four hours before we can get on that half hour flight from New York to Washington. In effect we will be making better time catching a train. Then, after the “shoe bomber” we were made to take off our shoes in good Muslim fashion, when on our way to the plane, but after the “underwear bomber” we will yet have to prove that our underwear is clean – and watch the face of the agent that will be made to check them. That is more then what we are ready to bear – so we will be pushed by those Islamists, to cry out – WE WANT GOOD, FAST, AND CHEAP TRAINS – if the Chinese can have them we want them also!

The bottom line for this article is thus – we thank the unsuccessful bomber for making us do what we were not ready to do otherwise – to call for a high speed line from Washington to Chicago and make sure that the air connection is eliminated. This so that we buy less oil from the home country of that bomber, and from any other country that suports with our oil-money his agressive coreligionist brothers and sisters in arms.

The lesson from the Christmas day attack, less then one week after the Copenhagen meeting, and exactly one week since the NGOs there demanded it – air transport for the civilized world will be reduced to only where absolutely necessary – like in Washington – Beijing traffic.

And think for a moment – on December 22nd we thought that waiting in an airliner on the tarmac was the major problem, and the Administration decreed a very serious penalty on those airlines that keep the passengers cooped inside the plane. See how much more serious can be the problems imposed on the industry by outsiders. But then, the delays showed us that even in best of conditions it makes no sense to fly short distances.

————

Chinese Harmony Train Sets Speed Record.
By UCN on December 28, 2009

China streaked ahead of its western and Asian rivals at the weekend by unveiling the world’s fastest longdistance passenger train service.

The Harmony express raced 1,100km in less than three hours on Saturday, travelling from Guangzhou, capital of southern Guangdong province, to the central city of Wuhan. The journey previously took at least 11 hours.

The improvement illustrates how China’s huge investment in infrastructure is dramatically shrinking the country, yet the economics of the new service, which runs 56 times a day, remain unproven amid a build-it-and-they-will-come approach to transport.

“China has focused on building expressways but that is an American method,” said Zheng Tianxiang, a Guangzhou-based infrastructure expert and government adviser.

“Expressways are not suited for China, which has large numbers of people but little space to spare. China should learn from Japan and Europe.”

The Harmony express, which reached a top speed of 394km per hour in pre-launch trials, travelled at an average rate of 350km per hour on its debut. This compared with a maximum service speed of 300km per hour for Japan’s Shinkansen bullet trains and France’s TGV service. In America, Amtrak’s Acela “Express” service takes 3½ hours to trundle between Boston and New York, a distance of only 300km.

According to state media reports, the government spent $17bn (€12bn, £11bn) on the Harmony express line’s construction over 4½ years. Wuhan invested $2.4bn in a new Frenchdesigned train station, which boasts 20 tracks and 11 platforms. Officials this weekend declined to confirm project costs.

Ticket prices have been set at Rmb780 ($115, €80, £72) for first class and Rmb490 for second. The country’s airlines, which like the railway are mostly state-owned, have responded by slashing fares to undercut those for the new train, with China Southern Airlines, based in Guangzhou, offering tickets for advance purchase starting at Rmb250 and introducing hourly flights.

Huang Xin, head of passenger services for Guangzhou Railway Group, said on the inaugural ride that pricing might have to be adjusted.

Even the second-class fares may prove too rich for the biggest pool of potential passengers for the line, the estimated 20m workers in the Pearl river delta manufacturing belt around Guangzhou who hail from inland provinces. About half of them usually return home during the Chinese new year holiday in the world’s biggest human migration. The round-trip express fare is priced at about two-thirds of an average factory worker’s monthly wage.

Most passengers on the sold-out debut run were middle-class leisure travellers drawn by the journey’s novelty value. “We are not staying in Wuhan,” said Qiu Chaoyue, a Guangzhou resident who tried out the new rail link with a group of friends. “We’re going to take the next train back to Guangzhou.”

Another disadvantage of the new service is that the stations at each end of the line are at least an hour’s drive from their respective city centres.

The railways ministry intends to complete 18,000km of high-speed rail lines by 2012, allowing travel between most Chinese provincial capitals in eight hours or less.

One reason for the enormous construction outlay for the Harmony express was difficult terrain. The train travels along 713km of elevated tracks and tunnels, accounting for about 70 per cent of its length.

Police were posted along the route to guard potential sabotage points, while burly railway security personnel monitored each passenger car. The police outside were often joined by farmers, who stopped to watch the Harmony express rush by their rural homes.

In spring and summer, the train will travel through a lush agricultural breadbasket, especially in the rice-growing areas of southern Hunan province. But in the dead of winter, it traverses a bleak, monochrome landscape of fallow fields and dirt roads that turn to mud in the rain.

We find the following a good summary of movements by people and of the description of the locale which we did not get to see ourselves from the inside, but which we know well from gleaning information from were we could. But having said that, we must add immediately that we have strong disagreements with the assumption that the UN was, and is, the right place to deal with a problem that needs an immediate solution. If one is ready to remove his blinders when analyzing the UN as a problem solver, rather then the nest of intrigue it really is, then one could also figure out when and how to use the UN’s services. One could also be free to initiate the needed process to change this institution from the club of victors of WWII into a potential super-government structure as needed in a world that has become so inter-dependent – that whatever afflicts a remote corner of the world becomes very soon a menace to everyone were we live right here.

Ban Ki-moon and Yvo de Boer are civil servants within the UN system, they are no gods, and now we can say also, they proved that they are no leaders. Flying around the world declaiming with a smiling face SEAL THE DEAL did not create a deal that one can seal.
Yvo de Boer got of the mantra in October, but Ban Ki-moon just declared today at the UN that he sealed a deal in Copenhagen. Does this negate in any way the lamentations we hear from our friend Bates, or it simply turns the UNSG into plain laughing stock?

When it became quite clear that going to Poznan in December 2008, without active US participation, and thus no way to have also China, India, Brazil etc. at the table was counterproductive. Why the Europeans did not speak up is beyond me – and I can say at least that I personally raised that question with Denmark Prime Minister Rasmussen in September 2008, and can say that I did not walk away with the feeling that success was the goal of organizers of the December 2009 Copenhagen meeting.

The bottom lines of these comments are that the fact that we would have wanted to see a much better outcome does not give us the right to blame President Obama for the lack of agreement to what was nothing more then a bundle of wishes.

Whatever the critics may think, Obama took a dead issue with lots of quasi-leaders running around and spreading accusations, but not ready to negotiate a deal, and for the first time managed to move the issue quite a few squares ahead. Yes – he did get China, India and South Africa to say for the first time ever that they also have responsibility to think of limits to the human mischief committed against the planetary environment. This is clearly not something they will easily wiggle away from.

Further, the Europeans are already starting to review their own positions and look for internal change having found out that the world of the 21st century may look very different with China, India and Brazil commanding much more power then any one European State if not aggregated in a real EU. Having three out of five seats at the UN Security Council in 2010 means absolutely nothing while the new comers are not part of the game.

Now about Mexico City, please remember that there is on the way another stop in Bonn, and there is not even a Conference Building ready for a May 2010 meeting in Bonn. I would suggest that NGOs and the Press get used to the idea that the difficulties in Copenhagen will turn out nothing to what expects them in Bonn.

But again, this is not yet our evaluation of the Copenhagen meeting – this posting is intended only as a further elaboration to the fact that we think Obama achieved much more then could have been expected from him. His further moves will involve cooperation with those countries that in his mind count indeed when it comes to make efforts to curb the GHG effects.

Also, I believe in the people – and Copenhagen was a clear success story when one realizes that it publicized the issues. The people will take on the ball that is thrown at them by the Islamists and combine in their thoughts their needs with what they heard about Copenhagen. I assume for instance that the people will create the demand for rails in order to avoid flying short distances. With the Unions coming on board it might even allow for some new tax on fuels – this will be perhaps have also social aspects and a reaction against oil imports. Could there be a positive change in US attitude towards Latin America? After all not everyone is a friend of the US, but some relationships can be improved easier then others.

The outcomes from Copenhagen are varied and complicated – the only thing that is sure is that tomorrow is different from yesterday.

————–
 http://www.culturechange.org/cms/index.p…

30 December 2009

Copenhagen’s Fateful Friday and Obama’s Real Role.

by Albert Bates
27 December 2009, published December 30, 2009.
“Cokenhagen” blog’s last day
Leaving Copenhagen before sunrise, we passed into the airport terminal revolving doors, each panel emblazoned with the “Hopenhagen” logo, but beneath it was revealed Hopenhagen’s corporate sponsor, Coca Cola, taking credit for the advertising campaign. Hope has died but Coke survived.

Upstairs from the revolving doors was a TckTckTck/Greenpeace billboard with Nicolas Sakozy, Premier of France, reading, “I’m Sorry. We could have stopped catastrophic climate change… We didn’t.”

We are still mulling the meaning of humanity’s giant step away from survival. No targets, no timetables, no firm commitments, a crash of the carbon market, massive disinvestment in renewables and a switch back to coal and gas – all of these are the “Copenhagen Outcome.”

Perhaps the strangest and most serious outcome was the damage wrought to the UN negotiation process itself. One needs to go back and re-read the 1972 Stockholm principles, the document that emerged from the 21st plenary session of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment. From the preamble, authored by Maurice Strong:

“Man is both creature and moulder of his environment, which gives him physical sustenance and affords him the opportunity for intellectual, moral, social and spiritual growth. In the long and tortuous evolution of the human race on this planet a stage has been reached when, through the rapid acceleration of science and technology, man has acquired the power to transform his environment in countless ways and on an unprecedented scale.
“The natural growth of population continuously presents problems for the preservation of the environment, and adequate policies and measures should be adopted, as appropriate, to face these problems.

“A point has been reached in history when we must shape our actions throughout the world with a more prudent care for their environmental consequences. Through ignorance or indifference we can do massive and irreversible harm to the earthly environment on which our life and well being depend. Conversely, through fuller knowledge and wiser action, we can achieve for ourselves and our posterity a better life in an environment more in keeping with human needs and hopes. There are broad vistas for the enhancement of environmental quality and the creation of a good life. What is needed is an enthusiastic but calm state of mind and intense but orderly work.”

With our laptop and a wall socket at JFK, we were able to watch Rachel Maddow’s interview with Andrea Mitchell and learn how freakish and noir the COP-15 talks really were. Looking for Premier Wen Jiabao of China, President Obama followed a lead to a back room at the Bella Center, his press pool in tow.

Before the COP, the United States and China had been sniping at each other over demands that Beijing agree to international monitoring, ostensibly to verify its pledge to reduce by 40% the carbon intensity of its economy (the rate of emissions per unit of economic activity, something that is easy to do if you are growing your GDP by 10% annually).

After the President and Hillary Clinton made some snarky remarks about China’s transparency, Premier Wen used diplomatic finesse to express his official displeasure. Twice on Friday, Mr. Wen sent an underling to represent him at meetings with Mr. Obama. Each time it was a lower-level official.

The White House made a point of noting the snub in a statement to reporters. According to an aide who passed it to the New York Times, Mr. Obama confided to his staff: “I don’t want to mess around with this anymore. I want to talk to Wen.” The story the Times then began spinning has formed the official frame of the talks — China was the bad actor, the US President stood tall and went dragon hunting, he slew the beast in its lair, and emerged with a new Accord, which was not the best, but the best that could be salvaged. “This progress did not come easily, and we know that this progress alone is not enough,” he said. “We’ve come a long way, but we have much further to go.” The carpenters then moved in to break the site down and make way for a trade show of home furnishings.

What actually appears to have happened is that the US came into the UN meeting with all the style and substance of John Bolton, Dubya’s UN ambassador. Arriving on the final day with a lame, lowball proposal, Obama tried to ram a strictly voluntary, symbolic pledge system down the throats of the delegates, who despite the media clouding, were actually close to several important agreements.

China backed Africa. Africa did not want voluntary, symbolic pledges. So the White House tried to set up a third meeting between Obama and Wen. It also set up a separate meeting with Jacob Zuma of South Africa, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, and Manmohan Singh of India. China apparently got wind of this sequence of meetings and called those players together on its own, before the Obama meeting.

When Denis McDonough, the national security council chief of staff, and Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, learned of the Chinese pre-meeting, they passed the word to the President and he rushed to China’s room.

It bears mentioning here that the Bella Center has a very curious layout, thanks to the Danish hosts. All of the national delegations were assigned a Bella Center office and display space for administration, conferencing and receptions, which was typically a plastic-walled Star Wars battlecruiser cubicle between 24 and 48 square meters in size. There were no distinctions based on population size, GDP, or emissions, but there were some differences in both placement (near or far) and size between G-77 (130 poor countries, green in the image), G-30 (the industrial economies headed by Merrill Lynch’s William McDonough, no relation), and a few VIP countries who rated special treatment.

China, with a quarter of the world population and emitting 20% of GHG emissions, was given a 2-room box in the back row of offices. The US, with 5% of the population and also about 20% of the emissions, got a glass skybox suite with conference rooms, communications center and a mini-Oval Office. This was the safe home for climate deniers James (Torture-9) Inhofe and Marsha (No Czars, No Death Panels, Demand Obama’s Birth Certificate) Blackburn, as well as the travel office for high-level junketeers Nancy Pelosi, Bart Gordon, Henry Waxman, John Kerry, Ed Markey, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jim Doyle and many, many other USAnians needing photo ops in the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

Locating China’s tiny room at the downstairs back, just behind the boiler room, under the steam vents, where the greenish neon lights flash intermittently through a high window and there is a faint odor of solvents, Mr. Obama called from the doorway. “Mr. Premier, are you ready to see me? Are you ready?” From inside a room that was already stuffed with Presidents Zuma, Lula, Singh and their top aides and translators, Wen, surprised, beckoned Obama to enter.

The Chinese, who had to send their people out to make room for Obama and his aides, balked at admitting the White House press pool to the fluorescent-lit craps game. Gibbs pressed forward with the pool’s photographer. “My guys get in or we’re leaving the meeting.” They squeezed Gibbs in, which yielded this (hands over head) photo from Doug Mills at the NY Times:

Despite whatever had been discussed by Zuma, Lula, Singh and Wen before Obama arrived, the US got its wish for a barebones “accord.” Danish hosts Rassmussen and Hedegaard, and UN leaders Ban Ki Moon and Yvo de Boer, none of whom had slept more than 2 hours in the previous 48 trying to broker a highest denominator deal, were not invited.

Obama, seated, started by asking what they could agree on. That settled a number of issues, including changing the wording on monitoring and verification to satisfy Mr. Wen. The other 188 countries were not asked for an opinion, although Mr. Obama then shopped his “Copenhagen Accord” around to a few European leaders, who each declined to join such an outrageous outlaw process. Ban Ki Moon and Yvo de Boer tried to put a nice face on it, but had to be steaming inside. They said the next COP in Mexico would resume the process, but as George Monbiot opined, Mexico is where negotiations go to die.

Having destroyed the whole notion of consensus negotiations carefully crafted over the 37 years since Stockholm, Mr. Obama joined his waiting motorcade and exited. In 8 hours, he had done more to destroy the fabric of the United Nations than his predecessor had accomplished in 8 years.

As for the $10 billion dollar per year pledge Hillary Clinton offered to support clean green economies in the 2/3 world, beginning in 2012, the US knows it will simply borrow that money from China and the loan will vanish in the slippage of the dollar against the huan.

Hugo Chavez told Amy Goodman, “We have to transition ourselves to a post-petroleum era, and that is what we must discuss.”

Goodman asked him about reducing Venezuela’s emissions. Chavez replied, “We must reduce emissions 100 percent… We are in agreement — we must reduce all the emissions that are destroying the planet. However that requires a change in lifestyle, a change in the economic model. We must go from capitalism to socialism, that’s the real solution.”

“How do you throw away capitalism?” Goodman asked. Chavez replied, “They way they did it in Cuba. The way we are doing it in Venezuela. Give the power to the people and take it away from the elites. You can only do that through revolution.”

Being more evolutionary than revolutionary, we are still betting on the dolphins. They can survive even without T-mobile and a laptop.

* * * * *

Read all about Albert’s observations and adventures in Copenhagen and Hopenhagen on his blog. For more on his peak oil work, see the Culture Change article Albert Bates, guide for our post-petroleum, globally warmed future. For more articles on or by Albert on this website, visit this listing

Cokenhagen propaganda

From Monica Alessi ( Monica.Alessi at ext.ceps.eu) we learn that the Center for European Policy Studies – CEPS – a Brussels based Think Tank – is tackling now the issue that we wrote about a long time ago – at least a year ago.  The Copenhagen meeting was doomed by its organizers at the UN, and by the world’s reality. It can be only a G2 – US and China that has any chance at dealing realistically with Global Warming / climate change, and there will not be a G3 to include the EU – this because of the other reality – the fact that the 27 members of the EU do not want to create a strong union, and by their own choice have thus doomed themselves to irrelevance when it comes to global leadership. Japan is also left outside the new inner circle that is destined to become eventually a UN CLIMATE SECURITY COUNCIL that will include besides the US and China also the IBSA States – India, Brazil, and South Africa. The first two because of their strong development pace and the latter in order to have present also an African country – and the reasonable pick is thus South Africa that has indeed a high potential for development. Russia is not in this game either, and we believe that with time Russia itself will apply also for membership in the EU which will thus become its own mini-UN with its own high economic potential if they ever decide to create a stronger union led by an Administration that has power to govern large and mini-States – at least in a way how the US Federal Government manages its affairs. That is when the EU will indeed become a “G.”

The present UN Security Council has a P5 that leads it, and aspires to be considered the G5 that they believe they are because they are the 5 governments that command the officially acknowledged atomic weapons. But when it comes to Climate issues – the weapon that wields power is rather the combination of size of the economy, the population numbers, and the quantifiable amount of GHG emissions by the year 2050 that will determine supremacy! To understands that better we posted the Professor Schwartzenberg scheme that helps us rank the UN members according to their true values – which obviously counts size of the contribution to the UN as a measure of size of the economy. In the Climate arena, it can be contended that size of GHG emissions is also a measurement of the size of the economy if we do not want to say blatantly that the emissions measure the size of the destructive power of the states because of their impact on climate. If the EU stays un-united they are just not part of that leadership even today. Even without going into this sort of calculations, it is clear nevertheless, that the precious day President Obama spent in Copenhagen, was much better utilized in his meetings with the Chinese then it would have been in meetings with Europeans as after all – it is not for him to help Europe figure out what is best for themselves.

The Alessi e-mail tells us:

In a new CEPS Commentary (from 25 December) on the implications of the Copenhagen Accord on the EU, Christian Egenhofer and Anton Georgiev are wondering why the outcome is seen so differently in the EU and the US and find very different expectations and perspectives on both sides of the Atlantic.  The Commentary, which is attached but can also be downloaded at http://www.ceps.eu/book/copenhagen-accor… argues that the Copenhagen Accord can be an important first step towards an architecture, but i) shifts from a top-down target and timetables approach to voluntary pledges, ii) cements very inequitable table carbon budgets, iii) brings the world onto a pathways to 3.2° C at best while iv) raising major issues on the negotiation mode.

Yet, the Copenhagen negotiations may not be remembered for their impact on the future climate change architecture but in making visible a new world order, with the US under Obama working towards a network of partnerships with itself at the core to preserve its influence in the world.  In turn this raises a number of hard questions for the EU:

-          Should the EU declare – the US-made – Accord a success or acknowledge the absence of EU influence?
-          Does the new EU Lisbon Treaty – the ‘EU constitution’ – offer possibilities to increase the role of the EU on the world stage?
-          Is continuation of a close relationship with the US still an option to ensure EU influence on the new climate architecture?
-          What are other options to ‘impose’ global carbon pricing, the main plank of EU policy?

The Commentary gives first tentative answers to all these questions – signed Christian Egenhofer.

Reference:
Christian Egenhofer & Anton Georgiev, The Copenhagen Accord: a fist stab at deciphering the implications for the EU.  CEPS Commentary, 25 December 2009: http://www.ceps.eu/book/copenhagen-accor… (or go to CEPS Shop, then to Commentaries)

The Copenhagen Accord

A first stab at deciphering the implications for the EU
Christian Egenhofer & Anton Georgiev
25 December 2009

The original purpose of the conference in Copenhagen (COP 15) had been to complete
negotiations on a new international agreement on climate change to come into force when the
Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period came to an end in 2012.  In the last two years,
however, climate change has assumed such an important role in the global agenda that an
unprecedented number of heads of governments – almost 120 were present – decided to meet
in Copenhagen to provide political leadership and give the final push for a global climate
change agreement, hoping thereby to lay the foundations for the new ‘global climate change
order’.  Days after the meeting ended, people are still asking themselves whether the gamble
paid off.  Almost everyone agrees that the outcome was far less than most had hoped for.  On
the other hand, the final outcome is better than what even the most optimistic observer could
have wished for after the conference entered into deep negotiations in the second week,
where deadlock built up. It is still unclear whether the agreement is “a disaster” (Swedish EU
Presidency) or represents “an unprecedented breakthrough” (US President Obama). Even the
EU seems to be divided. German Chancellor Merkel hailed the outcome as a ‘step, albeit a
small one towards a global climate change architecture’. What is striking is that the outcome
is generally seen in a more favourable light in the US than in Europe. This difference,
however, can be explained by different expectations and perspectives.

Expectations
Let us first start with the expectations. First, there has always been a high degree of optimism
behind the assumption that heads of governments – even at an unprecedented number – could
break the deadlock that has developed over the last two years. It has been the very same
governments whose heads met in Copenhagen that have been instructing the negotiators to
stick to their positions and made them dig themselves ever deeper into their trenches. And
ever since the end of last summer, it had become clear to virtually all participants that a
legally binding agreement was not possible – the downgrading started at the latest in mid-
October and was rubberstamped by heads of state at a meeting in Singapore of the Asia-
Pacific Economic Conference.  Nevertheless, the EU continued to hope for a ‘comprehensive
and operational’ agreement, including especially commitments for GHG reductions and
finance in line with their ‘responsibilities and capabilities’.

Second, closely related to the first point, the negotiations have become too complex for the
heads of governments to conclude. As argued by Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff of the FT, who
characterised them as ‘systems overload’,1 in the end the negotiations included issues
involving macroeconomic transformation, trade, development, R&D and innovation,
technology transfer, intellectual property rights. To conclude each of these negotiations
separately is a tall order on its own. To move them to the global scale, in addition requires
that negotiations are concluded in parallel. The belief that this can be achieved requires an
immense dose of optimism.

Third, for the EU Copenhagen was originally about the final sharing-out of the remaining
carbon budget of cumulative GHG emissions of around 1,550 billion tonnes of CO2eq that
are left until 2050.  For many other, including industrialised, countries, COP 15 has been
more about architecture than about cuts in carbon emissions as such.

Perspectives
We can find similar differences when it comes to perspectives. First, many developing
countries see climate change mitigation – rightly – as a short-term ‘constraint on economic
growth’, mainly but not only because it puts a constraint on the use of coal.  Industrialised
countries regularly respond with the ‘benefits of a green growth model’. As a result, in the
EU and some other industrialised countries, climate change mitigation is framed in the
context of green growth and jobs and future competitiveness.

Second, while the UNFCCC has set out the principle of historical responsibility, some
developing countries prefer to frame the debate in terms of carbon debt, thereby suggesting
that developed countries first need to pay back these debts (in terms of reductions or finance)
before developing countries take action. The emissions figures however tell us differently.
Without reductions by emerging economies, global climate change targets of 50% reductions
by 2050 simply cannot be met.

Finally, for many developing countries and emerging economies, the climate change issue is
framed in the context of adaptation. Impacts are typically the highest in countries with more
extreme weather conditions. In many cases, these countries are developing countries or
emerging economies. The government of India typically claims to be spending around 2.5%
of GDP on climate change. Moreover, developing countries, especially least-developing
countries are more vulnerable as their adaptive capacity tends to be lower than that of ‘richer’
countries.

1.  Main results of the Copenhagen Accord
Judging from the high rhetoric heard before the Copenhagen meeting, urging parties to
complete negotiations on a new international agreement on climate change to follow the
Kyoto Protocol, the results must be seen as a failure. The Copenhagen Accord – the
substantial outcome of the negotiations – does not impose actual and verifiable obligations, or
binding emissions targets in particular or finance contributions.  This fact, however, should
not be allowed to belittle the significant progress has been made in at least three areas:
financing, deforestation and adaptation.

• Developed countries for the first time commit to a goal of jointly mobilising $100
billion annually by 2020 from both public and private sources. Not only could this
unlock the finance standoff, it also gives further impetus for the development of
carbon markets. In addition, there is a collective commitment to provide ‘new and
additional, predictable and adequate funding’ amounting to $30 billion for the period
2010-12, with ‘balanced allocation between adaptation and mitigation’ with
adaptation funding being prioritised for the most vulnerable developing countries. The
major question is whether this commitment will be honoured, given the past record of
governments in bringing up really additional finance.

• There is an explicit acknowledgement to act on deforestation and forest degradation
and the establishment of a mechanism, i.e. a body, to mobilise the required resources.

• Action and cooperation on adaptation particularly in the least developed countries,
small island developing states, and Africa have been given ‘urgent’ attention with
developed countries committing to provide financial resources.  This could open the
way to addressing a key concern of developing countries.

For the EU, item 7 on ‘opportunities to use markets’ is of particular importance as it
recognises the importance of carbon markets, a key plank of EU policy.

Progress is also represented by the recognition of the scientific case for keeping the rise in
global temperatures to 2°C, but this recognition falls short of providing a credible pathway
for reaching this objective. Instead, the Copenhagen Accord inserts ‘domestic pledges’ to be
submitted by the end of January 2010.  Emissions reductions for the Annex I parties will be
measured, reported and verified according to guidelines, yet to be established. Mitigation
actions taken by non-Annex I parties will be subject to domestic measurement, reporting and
verification (MRV) reported through national communications, with international
consultation and analysis. The latter has been a major point of contention between the US and
China. Beyond that, the Copenhagen Accord remains vague. It makes a reference to 50%
reductions by 2050 compared to 1990. There is also a reference to developed countries’
commitment to reducing their emissions by at least 80% by 2050 but without mentioning
1990 as the base year. It also repeats the ‘equitable right of access to the atmosphere’.
Conspicuously absent is the recognition of ‘historical’ responsibility, despite a reference to
the UNFCCC.

No meaningful progress has been made on international aviation and maritime transport.
Following 2015, the Accord foresees a review including the long-term target.
Finally, due to opposition from a small number of countries, the COP itself did not adopt the
Accord but merely took note of it. It is therefore still uncertain what role it will play in future
climate change negotiations.

2.  An important first step?
Despite the ‘legal limbo’ in which the Accord is currently suspended, if and once adopted, it
could have major implications. These implications are to a large extent linked to the absence
of legally binding ‘targets’ and commitments, an area that so far has been at the centre of
attention – even if one has faith in the national pledges countries are due to file by the end of
January 2010.  But the implications of the Copenhagen Accord go beyond this. The document
also introduces a number of ‘architectural changes’ with potentially major repercussions for
the future climate change agreement.

2.1. A new architecture: From targets and timetables to voluntary pledges?
At about the same time that it became clear that there would be no legally binding agreement
– around October 2009 – it gradually transpired that what now has become the Copenhagen
Accord would not follow a ‘top-down’ Kyoto-style ‘targets and timetable’ approach, but
rather would take the form of ‘unilateral pledges’ or what the Harvard Project calls the
‘portfolio approach’ with some – of a yet unknown nature – mixture of domestic and
international compliance.  This is not dissimilar to the ‘bottom-up pledge-and-review’ model
that the Japanese government proposed prior to the negotiations leading to the Kyoto
Protocol in 1996.  If this approach prevails, it means that the Kyoto Protocol’s top-down
targets-and-timetables approach has been buried in Copenhagen.

By extension, this means that the original objective of “vacating and redistributing the
remaining carbon space” has been postponed and may never materialise.  Those who have
been occupying this carbon space – such as the US, Europe or the countries of the former
Soviet Union, and to a lesser extent many of the emerging economies – will continue to
occupy it to the detriment of least developed countries or countries with low per capita
emissions such as India and Indonesia. This has major implications for financial transfers.
The failure to ‘vacate’ the occupied carbon space due e.g. to physical limitations can only be
compensated by financial transfers, which constitute a kind of ‘rent’.

2.2. Inequitable carbon budgets
The Copenhagen Accord has confirmed that the current ‘grandfathering’ practise, expressed
through percentage reductions in current actual emissions, favours those currently occupying
the carbon space. Some simple calculations make this clear. On the basis of preliminary
figures – derived from pledges (see also section 3) – in all likelihood this means that the
remaining carbon budget will largely be used up by those occupying it now. For example,
there is a 50% chance of limiting the warming to 2°C at a maximum budget of cumulative
GHG emissions of around 1,550 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (Gt CO2eq).
This chance could increase to 74% if the remaining cumulative carbon budget – left until
20502 since the end of 2008 – to be distributed among the world’s nations is reduced to
around 1,050 Gt CO2eq,. Some calculations show that developed (or Annex I) countries,
accounting for 20% of the world’s population in 2005, have already contributed around 75%
of the cumulative CO2 emissions (from energy) until 2000 and above 50% of the cumulative
CO2 emissions since then.3 Given the range of pledges listed at Copenhagen, these countries
will have used up at least4 25-30%, or 36-43% for the stringent but more realistic budget,5 of
the total remaining GHG budget stock.6 And, meanwhile, some of the emerging economies
such as China, Brazil, Mexico, Korea or South Africa are about to consume the remaining
part, potentially curbing the economic growth ambitions of the least-developed and other
low-income countries (including India and Indonesia).7 The latter group of countries
collectively might need as much carbon budget as the developed countries are about to take
up from now until 2050, if they were to merely reach per capita GHG emissions of 4 t CO2eq
by 20308 and maintain that level until 2050.9  Many would expect such per capita emissions
as reasonable in order to make possible the approximately 8% economic growth needed to lift
people out of poverty. In all likelihood, currently existing and affordable technologies will
not enable this kind of economic growth without a significant per capita carbon emissions
increase.  One could argue that during the review of the Copenhagen Accord starting in 2016,
the target might be strengthened, as incidentally the Accord suggests.  We leave the
judgement of the likelihood that this will actually happen to the reader.

2.3 An emissions pathway towards 3.2°C at best
The Copenhagen Accord asks Parties to formalise their pledges by the end of January 2010.
To date, the most ambitious upper limit of the pledges for 2020, combined with the
implementation of the national plans in China and India, would bring the globe towards a
3.2°C increase by 2100 at best, according to estimates by the Climate Action Tracker.10
These pledges are estimated to reduce the projected 57 GtCO2eq in 2020 to 48 GtCO2eq.
Such a level of emissions increases the likelihood of exceeding 2°C to roughly 70%,
according to Meinshausen et al. (2009). Impacts will be mainly felt in least-developed
countries and in other low-income countries – as they have least means to adapt – but also by
future generations in emerging economies and developed countries.

2.4 More questions on the negotiation mode
The events in Copenhagen have exposed institutional shortcomings. Copenhagen has raised
doubts on whether the ultimate resource, i.e. heads of government, was deployed in the most
efficient way.  Even high-level participation did not ensure that the deep divisions between
developed and developing countries would be overcome. At the same time, the negotiations
have called into the question the assumption that a deal can be more easily reached if the
number of countries involved is kept small. These two analyses, however, pull into different
directions and warrant closer examination.

while the higher estimate also includes an assumption of 80% below 1990 levels. The two cases resulted in
Annex I cumulative emissions of 377 Gt CO2eq in the best case scenario and 456 Gt CO2eq in the more realistic
case (2009-49).

3.  A new world order?
A major difference in the appraisal of the Copenhagen outcome on both sides of the Atlantic
may lie in the fact that the world has witnessed – possibly for the first time in history –
fundamental new realities of the ‘new world order’. As the Washington Post notes,
developing nations, though not always united, nonetheless exercise a commanding role in a
large majority in United Nations gatherings such as the Copenhagen conference. At some
point, these majorities prevail.  Copenhagen therefore may have been a glimpse into a new
world order in which international diplomacy will increasingly be shaped by cooperation
between the United States and emerging powers, most notably China. In fact, the
Copenhagen negotiations boiled down to President Obama and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao
personally hammering out a pact both could live with, even if many other leaders could not.
Jake Schmidt, international climate policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Fund,
an environmental NGO, cited in the Washington Post (20 December), remarked: “Coming
into this conference, it was about 193 countries, and coming out of it, it clearly came down to
a conversation between the leaders of those two superpowers.” The leaders of Europe, Japan
and other countries at the summit were largely left to rubber-stamp the deal.  This may have
been why the Swedish Prime Minister’s office let it know that the result was ‘a disaster’.”
Therefore, the Copenhagen Accord essentially reflects the domestic political realities not only
in Washington but also Beijing. Both remain more cautious than for example the EU about
establishing a strict set of international rules. The agreement, which allows nations to set their
own emissions reduction targets without a firm deadline for signing a binding international
accord, ensures full national sovereignty. This may have touched a raw nerve revealed by the
findings of a new report by the European Council on Foreign Relations (see Shapiro & Witney,
2009) that documents how the US under Obama works towards a network of partnerships
with itself at the core to preserve its influence in the world.

4.  What are the EU’s options?
As we have said before, the EU went into the negotiations shoulder to shoulder with the US
with the objective to achieve a ‘comprehensive and operational’ agreement, leading to a
roadmap towards legally binding commitments on GHG reduction targets and finance. It did
not get it. In the end, the fact is that Europe as well as Japan played a very limited role at the
centre of the negotiations. This state of affairs will surely provoke some internal reflections in
the EU on its future role in the international negotiations.

The EU faces several options:
1. The EU could attempt to declare Copenhagen a success. Chancellor Merkel made an
earnest effort at it, attempting to discredit stakeholders and climate activists by saying
they were overly pessimistic.11 French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime
Minister Gordon Brown spoke along similar lines.12 However, this would throw away
the opportunity for Europe to reflect on what ‘leadership’ or at least a considerable
role would mean. We would expect that the press coverage in Europe would not allow
this strategy to persist much longer.

2. The Lisbon Treaty, as the EU’s new ‘constitution’, offers an opportunity for the EU to
play a bigger role in the negotiations, if it so wishes.  Ironically, the bad press that all
EU leaders received, including the climate leaders, may trigger a rethink on their part
on the desirability of attempting to play a bigger role in the future. Now that Merkel,
Sarkozy and Brown realise that international climate change negotiations do not
automatically allow for a shining role, they may find it attractive to allow the
European Commission to do more work in the negotiation trenches.  The next months,
which will see the implementation of the Lisbon Treaty, will be a crucial window of
opportunity.

3. The EU will have to answer the question whether it wants to keep its close
relationship with the US in the negotiations – as we described in a recent CSIS/CEPS
publication (see Egenhofer et al., 2009) – or whether it wants to develop its own
distinct position. This would require the EU to continue to develop its own position as
well as to challenge the US, where required. Given the importance it attaches to
historical responsibility and finance, the EU could become a possible bridge between
developed and developing countries. Already in Copenhagen negotiators and
observers wondered whether a break between the EU and the US position would not
have made a difference with respect to the outcome. So far, the EU has preferred to
stick closely to the US, which may explain why the EU did not play a major role in
the negotiations.
4. The EU could exercise leadership in future climate talks by pursuing a global ‘level’
pricing of carbon. There are two ways of doing this. One route would be to pursue
scaled-up post-2012 mechanisms that allow the establishment of a global carbon
price, but this would require the cooperation of other countries, notably developing
countries. Another route would be for the EU to impose an import tax on the content
of CO2 of all goods imported into the EU from countries that do not have their own
cap-and-trade system or equivalent measures. From a purely economic perspective,
this would be a straightforward way to move towards a global ‘shadow’ carbon price
even in the rest of the world. Such an import tariff improves global welfare because it
transfers, at least partially, via trade flows, carbon pricing even to those parts of the
world where governments have so far refrained from imposing domestic measures of
any magnitude. In other words, it creates a mechanism that enforces the pass-through
of carbon costs across the globe, therefore making domestic consumers pay the full
cost of carbon. A key effect of such a tariff is that it would always lower global
emissions. A paper by Gros and Egenhofer (2009) shows that there are solutions to
issues such as WTO compatibility and equity, the latter for example through rebating.
The latter move would have potential implications for the world trade regime and
international relations. Nevertheless, it should not be dismissed out of hand. What is clear
from the result at Copenhagen is that EU must engage in some serious re-thinking of its
strategy.  We strongly believe that business-as-usual is no longer a viable option. If the EU
continues to believe that climate change policy is important, it may need to make radical
choices. Otherwise the recent period of EU leadership in this critical domain risks becoming
a mere footnote in history.

1
Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, “Copenhagen lessons”, Financial Times, 23 December 2009, p. 8.

2
We took the respective global carbon budget (2000-49) for the above-mentioned probabilities from
Meinshausen et al. (2009) and subtracted the cumulative 450 Gt CO2eq (assuming a constant two-thirds of GHG
emissions are CO2 emissions) emitted in the period 2000-08.

3
Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT), v 7.0., World Resources Institute, Washington, D.C., 2009.

4
Assuming a linear decrease between 2008 and 2020 and then between 2021 and 2049, which is an optimistic
scenario as emissions should already have peaked in that case.

5
We take the Climate Action Tracker analysis as in Höhne et al. (2009) giving a high pledge for developed
countries of 19% reduction of GHG emissions (excluding LULUCF) below 1990 levels by 2020 (see also den
Elzen et al., 2009) and a low pledge of 11% reduction. The lower figure of the range for Annex I cumulative
2009-49 emissions also includes an assumption of reaching annual emissions of 90% below 1990 levels in 2050,

6
Climate change is caused by GHG concentrations as emissions stay in the atmosphere for up to 100 years.
Hence, historical cumulative emissions, i.e. the stock, matter.

7
A typical low-income country in terms of GHG emissions per capita is India with an average around 1.7
tonnes of CO2 equivalent per person in 2005 (see the CAIT database). An average EU citizen emits more than 6
times as much with around 10.3 tonnes, while a US citizen uses about 14 times the Indian carbon space. Hence,
in effect, developed countries together with most of the emerging economies have been occupying the world’s
carbon space.

8
This could be compared to the world average in 2005 of 5.9 t CO2eq per capita (see CAIT database).

9
For illustrative purposes, we took the countries with the lowest per capita GHG emissions in 2005, which
combined account for a population of roughly 3 billion (including Indians and Indonesians), as given in the
CAIT database. Taking their combined total GHG emissions in 2005 as a starting point (corresponding to almost
2 tCO2eq per capita excluding LULUCF), we then assumed a linear increase to 4 tonnes per capita in 2030 that
remains constant until 2050 while keeping for the sake of simplicity the 3 billion population fixed over the
whole 2005-50 period. This results in a cumulative 425 Gt CO2eq (2009-49).

10
See Höhne et al. (2009).

11
See http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/20… and
 http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/20… .

References
den Elzen, M.G.J., M. Roelfsema, S. Slingerland (2009), Too hot to handle? The emission surplus in the
Copenhagen negotiations, Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL), Bilthoven, The
Netherlands, December.
Egenhofer, Christian, David Pumphries, Sarah Ladislaw, Anton Georgiev (2009), Next Steps for the
Transatlantic Climate Change Partnership, A Report of the Global Dialogue between the European
Union and the United States. CSIS, December.
Gros, Daniel and Christian Egenhofer (2010), Climate Change and Trade: Taxing carbon at the border?, Centre
for European Policy Studies, CEPS Paperback, CEPS, Brussels (download preliminary version at:
 http://www.ceps.eu/system/files/article/…).

Ho?hne, Niklas, Michiel Schaeffer, Claudine Chen, Bill Hare, Katja Eisbrenner, Markus Hagemann, Christian
Ellermann (2009), Copenhagen Climate Deal – How to Close the Gap, Briefing paper, Ecofys &
Climate Analytics, 15 December.
Meinshausen, Malte, Nicolai Meinshausen, William Hare, Sarah C.B. Raper, Katja Frieler, Reto Knutti, David
J. Frame and  Myles R. Allen (2009), “Greenhouse gas emissions targets for limiting global warming to
2°C”, Nature, Vol. 458, 30 April.

U.S. greenhouse gas ruling sends message to world.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration’s greenhouse gas ruling Monday was meant to send a warning to industry, the U.S. Congress, and the world: with or without a law, Washington will tackle global warming in a serious way.

The Environmental Protection Agency issued a final ruling that greenhouse gases endanger human health, allowing it to put limits on emissions even if U.S. lawmakers fail to pass a law to achieve the same objective.

These are the ramifications of the long-expected decision:

* Timing: as the EPA made its announcement, negotiators from nearly 200 countries met in Copenhagen to work toward a political agreement to address climate change.

The timing was no coincidence: the EPA announcement was aimed at an international audience as much as a domestic one.

The U.S. position at the talks is undermined by not having a domestic law in place to curb emissions, but the EPA ruling should reassure other nations that Washington will force businesses to reduce their greenhouse gas pollution one way or another.

Obama’s message to world leaders: the United States is a serious partner in Copenhagen and on the climate change issue as a whole.

* Pressure: The House of Representatives has passed a bill that would cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions but the Senate has not. As lawmakers go back and forth on whether such rules would be good or bad for industry and the country, the EPA ruling will now be firmly in the back of their minds.

Obama’s message to lawmakers: hurry up and agree on a law, or the administration will take the reins and accomplish this goal without you.

* Risk: Though the White House has given the green light to the EPA finding, officials near Obama would prefer not to talk about it that much. Why? The president still firmly prefers a legislative solution to the problem of regulating carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions.

By making the threat that regulation will result if a law fails, Obama risks having to actually follow through.

Politically it will be more palatable for the president to tell Americans — especially in coal-producing states that will be hard hit by emissions curbs — that rules governing climate change were approved by their elected representatives rather than imposed by the executive branch.

If the economy does not recover soon, the short-term costs to industry of regulation could create long-term costs for Obama, whose fellow Democrats could lose seats in Congress.

Practically, EPA regulation could also get tied up in a series of legal challenges from businesses and environmental groups. A law would be less messy and potentially more efficient at cutting emissions quickly.

* Certainty: Companies often say certainty is crucial for business planning. Even those that are opposed to climate legislation or EPA regulation — and there are many — would prefer knowing what’s coming to not knowing, even if the ramifications are costly.

With the EPA’s announcement, pending legislation in Congress, and the U.S. position in Copenhagen all spelled out, industry can now assume that, one way or another, the United States will aim to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions roughly 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020.

For those that have not already started, making investments to cut industrial emissions and reduce carbon pollution would make sense … now.

Factbox

• Reaction to EPA’s climate change declaration
  Mon, Dec 7 2009

Related News

• EPA cleared to regulate U.S. emissions as Congress stalls
  Mon, Dec 7 2009
• US EPA issues final endangerment rule on emissions
  Mon, Dec 7 2009
• EPA to announce ruling on greenhouse gases -official
  Mon, Dec 7 2009
• US EPA to make ’significant climate announcement’
  Mon, Dec 7 2009

From:

December 11, 2009 | News covering the UN and the world.

Group claims evidence of systematic Zimbabwe election rapes

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and his party are guilty of a systematic campaign of politically motivated rape against opposition supporters during last year’s election season and should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity, says a report from advocacy group AIDS-Free World. Zimbabwean authorities repeatedly have refused to investigate rape charges. The Globe and Mail (Toronto) (12/10) , AllAfrica Global Media/Inter Press Service (12/10)

WE AT WWW.SUSTAINABILITANK.INFO SUGGEST THAT SUCH A GOVERNMENT’S PRESIDENT SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED PARTICIPATION AT NEXT WEEK’S HEADS OF STATE MEETING IN COPENHAGEN. HE IS NOT THE ONLY ONE – THERE ARE OTHERS – BUT A LINE MUST BE DRAWN IF ANYONE IS TO TAKE SERIOUS THE CONCEPT OF HIGH LEVEL MEETING AT THIS SORT OF CONFERENCE. WE BELIEVE THAT THE EU SHOULD EMPOWER DENMARK TO REFUSE VISA TO ROBERT MUGABE. ALSO, LET US REMIND OUR READERS HERE THAT AFRICA’S PUSH TO HAVE ZIMBABWE CHAIR THE UN COMMISSION OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT WAS A MAIN REASON FOR HAVING REDUCED THAT UN BODY TO STATUS OF PLAIN JOKE.

YES, AFRICA SEEMINGLY INSISTS ON INFURIATING THE CIVILIZED WORLD BY MAKING SUCH APPOINTMENTS TO ITS OWN PERIL – THIS BECAUSE IT PLAINLY CAUSES DIFFICULTIES WITH GETTING NATIONAL AGREEMENTS TO FUNDING GOOD CAUSES – THE KIND OF CAUSES THAT ARE CRYSTALLIZING NOW IN COPENHAGEN AND THAT WILL BE FURTHERED ONLY IF NEW FUNDS ARE CREATED TO HELP AFRICA WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF GLOBAL AGREEMENTS – OR CAREFULLY REVIEWED BILATERAL AGREEMENTS.

UN DAILY NEWS from the
UNITED NATIONS NEWS SERVICE
5 November, 2009 =========================================================================

GENERAL ASSEMBLY BACKS FINDINGS OF UN REPORT INTO GAZA CONFLICT

The General Assembly today endorsed the report of the United Nations investigation which found that both Israeli forces and Palestinian militants were guilty of serious human rights violations during the conflict in the Gaza Strip at the start of the year.

After two days of debate in the Assembly, at UN Headquarters in New York, 114 Member States voted in favour of a resolution endorsing the report’s findings and its recommendations for further action. Eighteen States voted against the resolution and another 44 countries abstained.

The probe, led by Justice Richard Goldstone, a former war crimes prosecutor at the UN war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, found that both sides committed serious war crimes and breaches of humanitarian law, possibly amounting to crimes against humanity, during the conflict in December 2008 and January 2009.

The four-member fact-finding team called for a number of measures, including the referral of the report to the Security Council, since neither the Israeli Government nor the responsible Palestinian authorities have so far carried out any credible investigations into alleged violations.

General Assembly President Ali Treki, speaking to journalists after the resolution was adopted, said that “this vote is an important declaration against impunity. It is a call for justice and accountability.”

Mr. Treki called on all concerned to devote themselves to implementing the contents of the resolution, which asks both the Israelis and Palestinians to carry out independent inquiries.

“Without justice, there can be no progress towards peace. A human being should be treated as a human being, regardless of his or her religion, race or nationality.”

The fact-finding mission was set up earlier this year at the request of the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council.

————————————

HRW Press

***Media Advisory***

UN: General Assembly Endorses Goldstone Report

(New York, November 5, 2009) – The United Nations General Assembly’s endorsement today of the UN Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict (the Goldstone report) is an important step toward accountability for the serious violations committed by all parties to the conflict, Human Rights Watch said.

“This resolution is important recognition that Israeli and Palestinian forces violated the laws of war and that perpetrators must be held to account,” said Steve Crawshaw, UN advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Now the clock is ticking, and both sides have three months to show that they will conduct credible domestic investigations.”

The General Assembly resolution, which passed by a vote of 114 to 18 (with 44 abstentions), calls on Israel and the relevant Palestinian authorities to undertake independent investigations within three months. It asks Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to report back to the General Assembly after three months on the progress the parties make.

Some European countries, such as Portugal, Ireland, and Switzerland, voted in favor of the resolution and more than eight others abstained, including the UK, Sweden, Spain, Norway, Russia, Denmark, Finland, and France. India, Chile, Mexico, and Turkey also voted in favor. The United States, Australia, Czech Republic, Israel, Italy, Hungary, Germany, Netherlands, and Poland were among the states that voted no.

The Goldstone report documents war crimes and possible crimes against humanity by Israel and Hamas during 22 days of fighting in Gaza and southern Israel in December 2008 and January 2009.

To date, Israel has convicted only one soldier for abuses during the Gaza conflict, and that was for the theft of a credit card. Hamas is not known to have disciplined or convicted any of its fighters or commanders for the thousands of unlawful mortar or rocket attacks into civilian areas in Israel before, during, and after the Gaza fighting.

For more information, please contact:
In New York, Steve Crawshaw (English): +1-917-385-2642 (mobile)
In New York, Fred Abrahams (English, German): +1-917-385-7333 (mobile)
In Jerusalem, Bill Van Esveld (English): +972-52-604-1120 (mobile)
In Washington, DC, Abderrahim Sabir (Arabic, French, English): +1-202-612-4342; or +1-202-701-7654 (mobile)
In Brussels, Lotte Leicht (English, French, German, Danish): +32-47-568-1708 (mobile)
In London, Tom Porteous (English): +44-79-8398-4982 (mobile)

——————————-

At UN, Pro-Israel NGO Is Out of Place, “Did We Capture Them?”

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 5 — Moments after the UN General Assembly voted 114 to 18 with 44 abstaining to endorse the Goldstone report on war crimes in Gaza, three speakers took to the UN Television microphone and spoke to the Press. First was Assembly President Ali Treki of Libya, who took only one question.

Next was the Permanent Observer of Palestine Riyad Mansour, who took questions in both Arabic and English. Inner City Press asked what Mansour expects of the Security Council, whose Permanent Five members fought against the referral of the Goldstone report. Video here, from Minute 5:47.

Finally a short woman took to the microphone, criticizing the resolution for not mentioning Hamas. Journalists took notes, one later telling Inner City Press he thought she was from the U.S. Mission. In fact, she was Anne Bayefsky of the Touro College Institute for Human Rights — that is, a non governmental organization or NGO.

A representative of the UN’s Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit monitoring the stakeout grimaced, but did not move to stop Ms. Bayefsky’s speech. (As Inner City Press reported, once when a representative of Western Sahara’s Polisario Front was speaking at the Security Council stakeout, the plug was plugged on the camera and microphone, later claimed to be an electrical system snafu.)

Two and then four UN Security officers arrived. After Ms. Bayefsky finished, they surrounded her and a young man she had brought into the UN with her. She was asked, How did you get him in? What type of UN pass do you have? The two were marched down to the UN Security office on the first floor.

Just then, Palestine’s Observer Riyad Mansour walked back the General Assembly. Inner City Press mentioned that a seeming pro-Israel NGO had spoke at the stakeout after him. Mansour stopped and asked, “Did we capture them?”

Palestine’s Riyad Mansour at a stakeout, “did we capture them?”

Inner City Press went down to the Security office. Minutes later, Ms. Bayefsky and her colleague were marched out by two blue shirted guards. Ms. Bayefsky called Inner City Press over. “This is your story,” she said. As Inner City Press took notes, one of the guards asked that the interview wait until Ms. Bayefsky was escorted out onto First Avenue. Missing, one wag mused, was the K-9 unit.

Once there, in the dusk, Ms. Bayefsky argued that other NGOs are allowed to speak at that stakeout, for example Human Rights Watch after the election of members to the UN Human Rights Council. Later Inner City Press verified this: May 17, 2007, video here. (By contrast, on November 5, 2009, the Bayefsky stakeout footage was not put on the UN’s website, after Mansour’s, here.)

Ms. Bayefsky stated that a white shirted UN Security officer with a large belly said that this was only happened because the Permanent Observer of Palestine was mad. (This bought to mind the Heisenberg Principle, that even by observing or reporting on something, inevitably it is changed.)

At stakeout Nov. 5, through a glass darkly

Some on the other hand view it as a crackdown after the UN and UN Security were embarrassed by KFC’s Colonel Sanders impersonator being invited to take photos with GA President Ali Treki, apparently by Treki’s daughter who works in the Office of the President. But was Colonel Sanders escorted to the Security Office and then out to First Avenue?

———————————-

At UN, After NGO Ejection, Questions About Stakeout By Evictees From Jerusalem

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 6 — The day after the UN ejected the representative of a pro-Israel non governmental organization after she spoke at the General Assembly stakeout against and after the endorsement of the Goldstone report on Gaza, the Palestinian Observer brought to the Security Council stakeout four people evicted for settlers in Jerusalem. Video here. {our comment – what is not good for the goose is great for the UN genders – just think of the UN as partisan to the last DPI official – the following seems like fun}

Inner City Press, which witnessed and covered the November 5 ejection, was informed that Patrick Ventrell of the U.S. Mission to the UN asked the UN Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit on what basis the evictees were speaking. MALU sources took this, not surprisingly, as a complaint or challenge from the U.S. Mission.

For the record, when Inner City Press asked Ventrell if he had complained to MALU, he said no. He acknowledged that he was personally curious on what basis the people were speaking at the stakeout. When first asked about the November 6 ejection, he said he hasn’t heard of it. When Inner City Press named the NGO, he nodded and said yes, he’d heard of it.

He asked, who told you I’d complained? Another reporter, not able to write the story, offered that talk of a U.S. inquiry with MALU was “only gossip.” Ventrell nodded. “And that’s not good reporting.”

So for the record, beyond Ventrell’s “round” denial, what we can and will report in the interest of adding another snapshot of how the UN works (or doesn’t) is that MALU sources tell Inner City Press that his question about the basis on which the Palestinian evictees were speak was interpreted as a complaint.

Spoken-with a second time, Ventrell genially emphasized that he was only asking the MALU staffer. But when one represents the world’s most powerful country, even one’s questions can be interpreted as more than that. And so it goes at the UN.

The largest question raised — what are the UN’s rules for who can speak at the stakeout? — has still not been answered. A senior UN official scoffed that he’s never heard of the NGO ejected on November 5, but had heard of Human Rights Watch, which he said is holding an event in a museum in New York. Mia Farrow was allowed to speak at the Security Council stakeout — but she is a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, it was pointed out. So what are the standards? MALU says to “ask the Spokesperson’s Office.”

———————————

From: UN Watch <briefing@unwatch.org>
Subject: Tonight’s Brandeis Debate: Did Goldstone admit UN colleague Chinkin was biased?

UN Watch Briefing
News and Analysis from UN Watch in Geneva     Vol. 210 |  November 5, 2009
Tonight’s debate: Did Goldstone admit UN colleague Chinkin was biased?

By Hillel Neuer

In tonight’s Brandeis University debate with former Israeli ambassador Dore Gold, Judge Richard Goldstone, author of the UN report on Gaza that bears his name, conceded that, had his UN inquiry been considered “judicial,” the prior statement of his colleague Christine Chinkin concerning Israel would have been sufficiently problematic as to disqualify her.

Recall that in a joint statement published on January 11, 2009 in the Letters section of London’s Sunday Times, entitled “Israel’s Bombardment of Gaza is Not Self-Defense — It’s a War Crime,” Chinkin declared that Israel was guilty of committing acts during Operation Cast Lead that were “contrary to international humanitarian and human rights law,” and of committing “prima facie war crimes.”

Goldstone’s concession on this point echoes what he told South Africa’s Business Day in an August 2nd interview: “If it had been a judicial inquiry, that letter she’d signed would have been a ground for disqualification.”

However, in the same breath as he effectively admitted the obvious—that her impartiality was irreparably compromised—Goldstone contradicted himself by defending Chinkin’s letter as being entirely irrelevant.

First, argued Goldstone, her letter was signed also by a number of eminent international law scholars.

Second, as he argued to Congress in his failed attempt to block this week’s House denunciation of the Goldstone Report, he said that Chinkin’s letter only dealt with the “technical” issue of whether Israel enjoyed the right to self-defense under international law, and not with the specific issues bearing on the inquiry.

Third, argued Goldstone tonight, Chinkin also condemned Hamas.

All of these arguments he has made before, several of which are documented in our legal brief. (See more at http://www.unwatch.org/goldstone.) Yet each is specious, misleading and without any basis in law. I believe that the jurist Goldstone knows this full well, but apparently believes that the ends (his desire to save Israel from itself) justify the means (accepting a biased colleague on his inquiry panel, just as he accepted to work under the UN Human Rights Council’s biased S/9-1 mandate that was never changed as a matter of law).

First, what probative value the existence of co-signatories has on Chinkin’s real or apparent bias is beyond me. But it is worthy of note that among the signatories so respected by Goldstone is one Richard Falk, the UN Human Rights Council’s permanent investigator of alleged Israeli violations, a man who has repeatedly accused the United States government of being behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Second, putting aside that the issue of whether Israel enjoys the legal right of self-defense is hardly “technical,” Chinkin’s remarks bear directly on the subject matter of the inquiry. Even had Chinkin only limited herself to accusing Israel of “aggression,” without opining at all as to the manner in which Israel conducted the war, this would have been clearly sufficient to create the appearance of bias on any matter related to Israel and the war.

But it’s worse: contrary to what she insisted during a May briefing with Geneva NGOs, and contrary to what Goldstone keeps saying, Chinkin’s letter also stated on the record—prior to her seeing any evidence—that Israel was guilty of committing acts during Operation Cast Lead that were “contrary to international humanitarian and human rights law,” and of committing “prima facie war crimes.”

That means she spoke on both jus ad bellum (whether the war was just) as well as jus in bello (how it was conducted). That Goldstone keeps getting away with saying she only addressed the former is testament to the culture of impunity that has surrounded this mission from its inception. (And, it is again important to note, even her comments on the former amounted to a sufficient disqualifier.)

Finally, about Chinkin’s supposed criticism of Hamas, which we are supposed to believe makes the letter either irrelevant, or somehow Kosher. Our legal brief from this summer, summarily dismissed by Goldstone, anticipated the specious argument that the letter’s single-line lip service on Hamas sanitizes her preemptive guilty verdict against Israel. We wrote:

The end of the statement includes one passing sentence on Hamas crimes, immediately followed by the qualifier that Israel’s “operations in Gaza amount to an aggression and is contrary to international law, notwithstanding the rocket attacks by Hamas.” No reasonable person could read the statement without concluding — as the Sunday Times headline writer did — that the crux of Prof. Chinkin’s joint statement was that “Israel’s bombardment of Gaza is not self-defense, it’s a war crime.”

In note 5 of the legal brief we added:

Some will no doubt seize upon this one sentence to exculpate Prof. Chinkin. This is to no avail. First, no reasonable person can read her statement in its entirety and deny that its central thesis is that Israel is an aggressor and war criminal. Second, even if the one sentence on Hamas were to be given weight, the gross abuse of due process arising from Prof. Chinkin’s commitment to a preconceived outcome regarding individuals on one side of the conflict — her absence of an open mind on the question put before the Mission — is hardly assuaged by an additional prior determination regarding individuals from the other side.

I salute the Brandeis student who raised the Chinkin matter tonight with Goldstone. While it was good of her to use our legal brief’s argument invoking the 2004 Sesay precedent, where an international war crimes judge had to step down due to remarks related to some of the parties, it also gave Goldstone a chance to access one of his previously-used escape routes. That precedent from the Sierra Leone tribunal, said Goldstone, dealt with a judicial panel, whereas his was something distinct.

But this is a distinction without a difference. Our arguments never relied on the Sesay precedent. Rather, we showed that international fact-finding missions (and not only judicial tribunals) are subject to the fundamental obligation of impartiality. In fairness, the Brandeis student did also remind Goldstone of his promise that the mission would be impartial, but he ignored this.

And so the question for Goldstone comes back to this: Was your fact-finding mission subject to the legal standards applicable to international human rights fact-finding missions? If so, given that impartiality is Rule #1 under those standards, and given that you concede that “[the] letter she’d signed would have been a ground for disqualification” in a judicial context, what is it about your own inquiry that renders Chinkin’s impartiality deficit suddenly acceptable?

Goldstone has consistently evaded any accountability under the law applicable to international fact-finding missions, by repeatedly declaring that his panel was “not judicial.”

But this is a red herring. The simple truth is that his fact-finding mission was legally subject to a well-established set of standards. Sadly, however, these were ignored.

(Source: UN Watch blog, http://blog.unwatch.org/?p=514.)

To support the vital work of UN Watch, please contribute here.

tel: (41-22) 734-1472 fax: (41-22) 734-1613
 http://blog.maskil.info/2009/11/last-day…

What does this have to do with a blog on Israel and Jewish affairs? Having lived through the fall of Apartheid and the all-too brief honeymoon period that followed, I find a number of eerie parallels between attitudes and beliefs held by White South Africans at the time, and Israel’s growing isolation and withdrawal today. (What I am not doing, though, is to compare the Apartheid system of Separate Development with the situation in Israel. Such a comparison is inaccurate and unjust and gives ammunition to those who simply wish to demonize Israel.)

In January 1978 – along with tens of thousands of other school-leavers, graduates of our Christian National Education system – I began my National Service with the SA Defence Force. I was not politically mature (or even aware), and believed that we were doing our part to save Southern Africa from what had befallen the rest of Africa: domination by the militant Black nationalism and Communism that had led to the ruination of the continent; the Total Onslaught.

We believed that the struggle would continue for decades, perhaps even centuries to come. Our children and grandchildren would be called on do their duty to save “Volk en Vaderland” (we used those words) from the savagery of raw Africa. Little more than a decade later, Mandela had been released from prison, the CODESA talkshad begun and democratic elections were on the horizon.

That bears repeating: little more than a decade later.

How was this possible? We firmly believed that with South Africa’s mineral and other natural resources, her control over the Cape sea route (the Suez Canal had been closed since 1967), her military might, etc., The West could simply not allow this prize, this bastion of civilisation, to fall to Communism. Voortrekker terminology about drawing the wagons into a defensive circle or Lager (the “Lager mentality”) was common on both sides of the argument. Vesting Suid Afrika (Fortress South Africa) would hold out until such time as The World (not us) was brought to its senses.

Behind the scenes, however, senior SADF figures were warning their political masters that the most they could do was give the politicians breathing room to make a deal. Boycotts, disinvestment and sanctions had begun to cut deep into the SA economy, as had black labour unrest and events such as the Soweto Riots of 1976 (fomented mainly by school-goers). The National Party eventually cut a deal with its chosen successor – the African National Congress (ANC) – and then retired to seaside homes, cattle farms and inflation-linked pensions. The New South Africa experienced its brief Rainbow Nation phase before the slow slide into the current phase of reverse discrimination, corruption, rampant crime and ineffectiveness. The heroism, the mental and physical scarring, and the loss of many of our finest sons had become somehow irrelevant.

Today, Israel (like White South Africa in the 80s) appears to be living under the illusion that she has all the time in the world. The illusion that with her economy, the IDF, support from the US and Diaspora communities, she has no need to set her borders, find- rather than just seek – peace, and come to an accommodation with the other inhabitants of Palestine. There are far too many dangerous illusions at work here. The illusion of brave little Israel, alone against the world. The illusion that we don’t need peace; that we can survive in a state of low-intensity conflict forever. The illusion that we only need one ally, and that we are free to thumb our noses at her views when they don’t suit us. The illusion that the only outpost of democracy in the region would never be abandoned. The illusion that we can’t be replaced as America’s most dependable ally in the region. The illusion that we contribute too much to the world to be cast aside. The illusion that we are right and the rest of the world is wrong. The illusion that we are protected by the lessons and guilt of the Holocaust. And, perhaps most dangerous of all, the illusion that the God of Israel would not allow her be destroyed again.

Israel has perhaps another decade to restore its status as a Rechtsstaat  (domestically, internationally and in the territories) and integrate itself back into the family of nations. Another decade before the same forces that ended 40 years of National Party rule in South Africa also put an end to the 40-year illusion of Greater Israel, and the hopes and dreams of Little Israel along with it.

In the immortal words of Hollywood enforcers and crime-fighters, “we can do this the hard way or the easy way”. For now, the choice is still ours.

Analysis of national climate action plans of emerging economies – Proposals for quantifiable emission reduction contributions of emerging economies.

Side Event at the UNFCCC Barcelona Climate Talks:

Tuesday, November 3rd 2009 
7.45 – 9.15 pm, Room LENTISCO

In this side event Ecofys and the Wuppertal-Institute, two German independent consultants, will present results of a recent analysis of national climate action plans of emerging economies (Brazil, China, India, Mexico, South Africa, South Korea) in regard to mitigation of GHG emissions.

The study includes an update of an ealier sector-based assessment of mitigation potential in 2008. Based on these results the presenters will introduce a preliminary assessment of options on how to integrate national appropriate mitigation actions in particular countries .

This study was commissioned by the Federal Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt, UBA), an independant scientific body of the Federal Environment Ministry, based in Dessau, Germany.

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Dr. Guido Knoche
Federal Environment Agency
- Climate Change Division -
D-06844 Dessau-Rosslau
eMail: guido.knoche[at]uba.de

Dear Friends,
I’m sitting here in New York City, and the whole 350.org team still has huge smiles on our faces. We just can’t stop watching the flood of images continue to flow in from around the world–5200 actions in 181 countries makes for a lot of gorgeous photos.

You can spend hours on the website looking at the 20,417 photos we’ve received  from last weekend’s day of climate action, but if you’ve only got three minutes this short video will give you a good idea about what happened:

 http://www.350.org/oct24-vid

I’ve been coordinating the translations for 350.org since the beginning, so my favorite part of the video is seeing the incredible diversity of people all over the world, speaking so many different languages–but all speaking with one voice.  Everyone in the video is joyful, passionate, and fired up by the knowledge that they are not acting alone.  They know, as you should, that there are millions around the world who are standing together for bold climate action. I think you’ll like the video as much as I do, so do take a couple of minutes to watch it now: http://www.350.org/oct24-vid

But we don’t want you to think we’ve stopped working and spend all day watching videos. Two days ago we met with the chief of the climate change section of the United Nations, Janosz Pastor. We gave him a book of photos that we prepared, filled with stories and news clippings about what happened on October 24th, and information about the 350 target.  The best news: he’s passing it on to UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon.

And that’s a good way to remind all of you that the first task on our post October 24 to-do list is delivering photos of your actions to your political leaders–local, regional, and national, and international.

Sign up here for to take part in a photo-delivery: http://www.350.org/deliverysignup
Our team at 350.org will follow up as soon as humanly possible–linking you up with people in your community who can join you for a delivery, providing tips and support for reaching your political leaders, and asking for your stories that we can share them with the world.

We’re sorry to put you back to work so soon, but time is short till the big UN Climate Talks in Copenhagen this December. Between now and then, the next stop for 350.org is Barcelona, Spain (my home country!) in early November. Why Barcelona?  It’s the location of the final UN Climate meeting before the crucial December talks.  In Barcelona, members of the 350.org team will be meeting with UN delegates, delivering photos and videos, and making sure that our collective call to action makes a a real impact.  Wouldn’t it be amazing if while UN delegates were receiving photos and videos of citizens all over the world calling for bold action, your local officials were feeling the same heat?  Help make it happen:
 http://www.350.org/deliverysignup

With your help, we will make every world leader know that we will accept nothing less than a fair, ambitious, and binding climate treaty that puts us back on the road to 350.

Thanks for all you do,

Teresa Niño for The 350.org Organizing Team
P.S. With your help, the video I included in this e-mail can go far and wide to let the world know what happened–please share in just two clicks on Twitter and Facebook.

You should join us on Facebook by becoming a fan of our page at facebook.com and follow us on twitter by visiting twitter.com

To join our list (maybe a friend forwarded you this e-mail) visit www.350.org
 350.org
 350.org is an independent and not-for-profit project.
What is 350? 350 is the number that leading scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. Scientists measure carbon dioxide in “parts per million” (ppm), so 350ppm is the number humanity needs to get below as soon as possible to avoid runaway climate change. To get there, we need a different kind of PPM-a “people powered movement” that is made of of people like you in every corner of the planet.