Developed Countries Needs To Do More

"The Copenhagen package must be comprehensive and balanced, where mitigation and adaptation is supported by finance and technology transfer to developing countries," said Shyam Saran, India's chief negotiator at the climate change talks in Bonn. "So anything that strays from this is of concern to us." 

Saran said that reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions needs to be "accompanied by clear detailing of equitable burden sharing." He added, "You cannot just do the arithmetic and say developing countries must play their part. Science cannot trump equity."

Must developed countries are "nowhere near meeting their targets." India chief negotiator accused developed countries of "trying to muddy the waters." He cited Japan's effort to shift the baseline for GHG emissions reductions from 1990 to the current date. "All these are efforts to get away from the legal document and to gloss over the fact that they are not meeting their legal targets."

According to a February article in the Guardian, developing countries have received less than 10 percent of the funds developed countries promised them to help them mitigate climate change. The past seven years, developed countries promised almost $18 billion, but actually gave less than $0.9 billion.

"It's a scandal. The amount the developed countries have provided is peanuts. It is poisoning the UN negotiations. What [the rich countries] offer to the poorest is derisory, the equivalent of one banker's bonus. It's an insult to people who are already experiencing increasingextreme events," said Bernarditas Muller of the Phillippines, the chief negotiator for the G77 and China group of developing countries.