U.N. Climate Talks Go Into Overtime
New policies on climate change continue to be tabled at the United Nations Climate Change Conference as the debate goes into overtime.
Although the conference was set to end on Dec. 9, delegates from around the world are meeting today in an attempt to reach consensus. Both the Kyoto Protocol and the Green Climate Fund are at the center of the debate.
Some headway has been made on the Kyoto Protocol. Delegates will decide whether to extend the protocol as-is on the condition that the United States, China and other large emitters agree to a binding deal after 2020.
The Green Climate Fund, however, is still at a point of contention. Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists told Voices of America he doubts the fund will be set before next year's conference in Qatar.
"It's all well and good to talk about long-term treaties post 2020, and that's essential and we support that and want to get a decision here launching a process to do that," he said. "But we also need a near term process to raise the level of ambition collectively, both developed and developing countries, to try to substantially raise efforts to close what's called the gigaton gap, which is the gap between the emissions reductions we have on the table and those that have to be made to stay under two degrees."
Kumi Naidoo, the head of Greenpeace, was expelled from the negotiation process after he took part in a form of protest in a hallway of the convention center.
He said he had to do something as felt the talks were going in a "completely unacceptable" direction.
"What we see here are baby steps," he told the AFP. "Baby steps is not what the situation calls for -- it calls for fundamental change."
Euronews reports that other acts of protest continue outside. Protesters are deterimined to continue to fight for issues of climate justice.
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