NUSA DUA, Indonesia -- The Harper government and the Bush administration caved in to international pressure at the United Nations climate change summit on Saturday, accepting the "Bali roadmap" towards a new comprehensive agreement to stop human activity from causing irreversible damage to the Earth's atmosphere and ecosystems.
The framework was hailed by the UN's top climate-change official, Yvo de Boer, as an ambitious, transparent and flexible solution on the road to a comprehensive treaty in 2009. He said it will impose deeper commitments on the richest nations in the world to slash their contribution to global warming, as well as softer targets or commitments for developing countries to come into force after the end of the Kyoto Protocol's first commitment period in 2012.
An environmental activist dressed as a polar bear strolls on the beach after the UN climate conference Saturday in Bali.
With the Harper government silent, several developing countries, along with the European Union members, protested, booed and resisted attempts by the U.S., which has not ratified the Kyoto Protocol, to impose what most of the countries felt were unfair obligations on the developing world in the fight against climate change.
The pressure eventually forced U.S. lead negotiator Paula Dobriansky to cave in and accept the consensus, allowing the Bali roadmap to be adopted.
In a subsequent debate of Kyoto countries, Canadian Environment Minister John Baird attempted to stop members of the protocol from declaring that developed countries should collectively strive to deepen their post-2012 targets in the range of a 25- to 40-per-cent reduction below 1990 levels by 2020.
The Harper government has insisted that such a measure would be impossible for Canada to achieve in 12 years. But following a series of rebukes, criticism and pleas from 17 different countries, Baird told the conference he would "stand down," garnering a warm ovation from delegates.
The concession also meant that he had failed to achieve his main objective of getting binding commitments for major emerging economies such as China and India to reduce their emissions in absolute terms.
Still, John Drexhage, climate change director with the Winnipeg-based IInternational Institute for Sustainable Development, said in a telephone interview from Bali that getting the United States, China and India on the same side "is a big breakthrough".
"This is essentially the kind of path we have to go forward on," he said.
Many delegates and observers suggested that the conference was forced to extend for an extra day, instead of wrapping up as scheduled on Friday, because of systematic efforts from the U.S., Canada and Japan to block them from officially recognizing that the next climate-change agreement should be guided by stringent targets in tune with the latest scientific evidence.
Baird was also accused of skipping out on key meetings during the final hours of the conference.
But Baird said he worked very long days, getting little sleep in the face of an intensive barrage of criticism levelled at Canada during the two-week conference. He said this was "the real price of leadership" for indicating his government's true beliefs about what was required in the best possible deal for the environment and the planet.
"A lot of countries were thinking what Canada was saying at this conference and simply put we have no option but to work hard for an effective agreement," said Baird, before taking a jab at Liberal Leader Stephane Dion. "I don't want to come to another conference in 10 years and have the deputy leader of my own party say I didn't get it done."
But Dion, who indicated that he had worked behind the scenes to build a consensus at the conference, said he was pleased that the process he started as chairman of the 2005 climate change summit in Montreal was moving forward.
Many observers, including the European Union's Environment Commissioner, said that Dion was "instrumental" in saving the Montreal conference and getting countries to agree to improve and extend the Kyoto Protocol.
"In 2005, in Montreal, we started a dialogue in order to prepare negotiations (even though) at that time, many countries did not want to hear the word negotiation, and now we'll start the negotiation," said Dion. "The main reason why (countries succeeded in Bali) is that China came here saying that they were ready to take commitments and they then created a dynamic that hopefully Canada (will) not kill."
With talks going into overtime on Saturday morning in Bali as developing countries protested last-minute changes to the Bali roadmap, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was forced to make an unexpected appearance expressing his disappointment that nations still had not reached a consensus.
"Seize the moment, this moment, for the good of all humanity," said Ban, in an official address to the conference.
CanWest News Service
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