$20 per year will not solve climate change, people’s voices must be heard

By Makereta Komai for Climate Pasifika in Bonn, Germany

03 June 2010, Bonn, Germany --- Ambassador Pablo Solon, Bolivia’s Ambassador to the United Nations has highlighted his country’s concern over current United Nations climate negotiations. 

And, he said voices of the real victims of climate change are being excluded from the negotiations.

"In April 2010 more than 35,000 people from 140 countries gathered in Cochabamba, Bolivia and developed the historic Cochabamba People's Agreement a consensus-based document reflecting substantive solutions to the climate crisis." Ambassador Solon said.

"We are therefore deeply concerned that the new text proposed as a basis for climate change negotiations does not reflect any of the main conclusions reached in Cochabamba. We made this proposal in line with UN rules, by the April deadline, but still they have not been included." Ambassador Solon said.

"Proposals from Cochabamba have been side-lined but every single element of the so called 'Copenhagen Accord' has been included, even though it was not recognised by the United Nations. This means that on finance we are only considering $100 billion a year to respond to climate change - just $20 per person in the developing world - to solve climate change. It's clear that climate change impacts are not going to be dealt with for just $20 per person." Ambassador Solon said.

"We urge the UN to embrace the conclusions reached by social movements, indigenous peoples and international civil society in Cochabamba. It is both undemocratic and non-transparent to exclude particular proposals from the negotiations, and it is imperative that the United Nations listens to the global community on this issue critical to humanity." Ambassador Solon said.

"In total 18 different ideas were excluded, including 50% emission cuts for rich countries by 2017, a 300ppm greenhouse gas stabilisation target, a proposal for a declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth and a new, realistic assessment of finance needed to fight climate change." Ambassador Solon said.

"There cannot be an equitable, transparent, and inclusive negotiation process, nor true solutions to the urgency of the climate crisis, if the UN negotiating text ignores the voices of the peoples of the world that the negotiators should be representing." Ambassador Solon said.

Ms Komai will be covering the Bonn Climate Change negotiations from 31 May – 11 June 2010, thanks to support from Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). She will provide daily coverage of the negotiations via PACNEWS and the SPREP website www.sprep.org and the climate pasifika blogspot, http://climatepasifika.blogspot.com