London, 21 January 2010

The UN's climate chief said today that many countries who signed up to the accord at UN climate talks last month would need more time before they can endorse it. A deadline to submit targets under the Copenhagen Accord is unlikely to be met, Yvo de Boer said. "Countries can indicate (targets or actions) by the deadline or later," de Boer told journalists in a press conference webcast from the headquarters of the UN Convention on Climate Change from Bonn.

"It’s a soft deadline, there's nothing deadly about it, " de Boer said in his first press conference since the Copenhagen summit.

He added that if countries failed to meet the deadline, they could still associate with the accord afterwards.

"In that sense countries are not being asked to sign the accord. They’re not being asked to take on a legally binding target, they will not be bound to the action which they submit to the secretariat. It will be an indication of their intent," de Boer said.

Information about which countries endorse the accord or submit targets or actions will be made public after the deadline, a UNFCCC spokesperson said.

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported a UN spokesperson as saying that nine countries had indicated they would "accept" the Copenhagen Accord.

The summit in the Danish capital failed to map out a clear path on a successor to the Kyoto protocol despite a mandate from the UN climate meeting in Bali at the end of 2007.

It was only in the final, frantic hours of negotiations in Copenhagen that an agreement emerged between rich and developing countries on the need to limit emissions so that global temperatures stay below 2C.

The accord, which is non-binding, did not specify emission reduction targets.

However, it got commitments from rich countries to provide short and long term finance from rich to poor countries for cleaner energy and adaptation.

‘Basic’ group

The accord, which was led by the US and big emerging economies such as Brazil, China, India and South Africa – the so-called 'Basic' group, was merely noted by the UN meeting of some 190 countries. Many poorer countries refused to back it, arguing that it condemned them to catastrophic climate change.

The Basic group of countries will meet in New Delhi on 24 January to discuss how to proceed with the accord.

De Boer said the task now for countries was to enshrine the accord in an agreement at the next UN climate conference in Mexico City in November.

"(The Copenhagen Accord) is an important tool to advance the negotiations," the UN climate chief said, adding that he hoped that the agreement would evolve into a "living document that tracks action."

But de Boer acknowledged that the UN meeting "didn't deliver enough" on paving a way to any future climate treaty.

"Copenhagen didn’t produce the final cake but it left countries with all the right ingredients to bake a new one in Mexico," he said.

Process

De Boer defended the UN process against accusations that including 190 nations in the process had made agreement impossible. "It’s clear that you cannot have all of the countries in all of the rooms all of the time in all of the discussions, and that it needs to be broken up into smaller meetings. Consensus is then brought to the larger meeting."

But many of the developed countries that took part in Copenhagen have described the talks as chaotic where endless debate over process blocked progress on key issues.

However, poorer countries have claimed that the Danish hosts and large emitting countries were trying to sideline small nations from the process and impose a deal upon them.

Reform

Both the UK and the US have said in recent weeks that the UN process needs to be reformed if it is to deliver agreement.

Other forums, such as the G8, G20 and the major economies forum, could play a more prominent role this year as only two UN meetings are scheduled so far, one in Bonn in late May/early June and the high level meeting in Mexico City.

De Boer said that the UN would decide whether additional meetings organised by the UNFCCC would be beneficial to the process.

Last year, UN negotiators met four times ahead of Copenhagen, but talks were deadlocked on most key issues and failed to whittle down proposals into a workable text.

Ends --

By John McGarrity , Point Carbon