190 countries together for ‘Green Climate Fund’
WASHINGTON: In Durban, South Africa, seeking an eventual global climate-protection plan, more than 190 countries begin the latest round of negotiations.
Environmentalists say one of this round’s main accomplishments could be the creation of a new “green climate fund” to help developing countries adjust in the 2020s.
Another might be an agreement that all major countries slash emissions, even if the details get left until later.
The United States is key to how the talks turn out, and environmental activists want it to stop blocking progress on both issues, said Kevin Knobloch, the president of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Knobloch and leaders of other major environment groups wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton this week urging her to make sure the U.S. position doesn’t send negotiations into permanent gridlock.
On Wednesday Knobloch said, “We need greater efforts by all major economies to meet this challenge, and we can’t wait another decade to lift our game.”
As talks opened Monday, one main task before negotiators is to improve ways to finance efforts to reduce emissions and cope with unavoidable climate-related problems in developing countries.
Developed countries agreed in 2009 to help raise $100 billion a year — from governmental and private sources — by 2020 to help poorer nations address global warming.
Much of this would go into what’s called the Green Climate Fund.
