Kyoto's the key

Tony Juniper Guardian News Service London

Next week 10,000 people will start to gather in Montreal for what are expected to be the most important climate change negotiations since the agreement of the Kyoto protocol in 1997 (United Nations Climate Change Conference Montreal, Nov. 28 to Dec. 9). Put simply, the scientific consensus is that only a small window of opportunity remains to avoid dangerous climate change.

If governments can take sufficient action to cut emissions within a decade or so, then there is a chance of avoiding going above the two degrees centigrade of global warming that could make climate change unstoppable, causing massive economic damage and millions of deaths. The Montreal talks, which will seek to set a framework for what happens after the first phase of the Kyoto agreement runs out in 2012, will be key to determining the future for all life on earth.

But because of conflicting signals given to different audiences during the past few months, the role played by the British prime minister leaves campaigners worldwide deeply alarmed. Tony Blair, who has helped to move climate change to the top of the international agenda, has enormous influence. What he says will shape how these talks go. This is why green groups have been so utterly appalled at some of the things he has said in recent months.

Two months ago, Blair dropped a bombshell. While on a platform with the U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, in New York, he was asked what he thought about climate change. His response departed from the long-standing EU targets-led position and lurched toward the U.S. view.

"I would say probably I'm changing my thinking about this," Blair said. "The truth is that no country is going to cut its growth or consumption substantially in the light of a long-term environmental problem. What countries are prepared to do is to try to work together cooperatively to deal with this problem in a way that allows us to develop the science and technology in a beneficial way." He added: "I don't think people are going -- at least in the short term -- to start negotiating another major treaty like Kyoto."

His expression of doubt about the political viability of firm pollution reduction targets clashed with the policies being expressed by his own ministers. The Bush-led "kill Kyoto" campaign and the coterie of climate change deniers seized on his words with joy.

And then, earlier this month, he again set out his views. Once more, he highlighted the false choice between development and the environment, saying that a more "sensitive and flexible" framework (than Kyoto) was needed.

Last weekend (Nov. 19-20), having been hammered by environment groups and governments around the world, Tony Blair shifted his emphasis again, once more claiming a commitment to legally- binding targets. Many people will only believe him, however, if that is a consistent message -- not only in his prepared speeches, but when he expresses his own opinion and in his dealings with George Bush.

Negotiating cuts:

Blair dug the hole deeper still when he told the British parliament last week that "the Kyoto protocol expires in 2012", when in fact that year marks only the end of the first commitment period. Montreal will need to negotiate what cuts come next, and if he is saying that the Kyoto process will expire, he is undermining the prospects for success at these talks.

Yet no one doubts that climate change is clearly the one environmental issue that has consistently been on Blair's international agenda. Shortly after moving into Downing Street, and a few months before the Kyoto meeting, he observed that: "At Kyoto, industrial countries must agree legally binding targets for significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions during the first decade of the next century... We in Europe have put our cards on the table. It is time for the special pleading to stop and for others to follow suit." Bold words -- including a clear rebuff to those in the U.S. who either refused to act or denied that there was a problem.

In the end, the industrialized countries agreed in Kyoto to modest cuts to their own greenhouse gas pollution. The compliance period would be between 2008 and 2012. Countries would average their emissions over that period so as to iron out any annual anomalies and would in the interim come back and negotiate what cuts would need to follow. Britain was justifiably proud. The plan was that we would build on this track record in the run-up to Montreal.

What happens now? We need Blair to back the European Union delegation going to Montreal with a strong and clear statement about the importance of legally-binding targets, with or without the U.S., and the need to come away from Montreal with at least a process for working out what those targets will be.

The outcome in Montreal will be determined by some 10,000 official participants, representing 190 national government delegations as well as environmental groups, including the international networks of Friends of the Earth, WWF and Greenpeace. Indigenous people, scientists and journalists will be there, alongside legions of industry lobbyists.

Oil producers, low-lying island states, huge industrial powers, emerging tiger economies and the most impoverished nations will negotiate together, individually and in blocs. They will be furiously lobbied, some will be lambasted, others nurtured as allies.

Debate will take place on the floor of the official UN meeting, although much of the deal-making will happen in bars and restaurants. Some meetings will go on all night. It will be chaotic and exhausting. Into this seething political cauldron will be injected the positions of the different countries. Critical among these will be that of the EU, led by the UK.

Kyoto is insufficient and has many faults. But at least there is a basis for moving forward. It sets some modest targets and broadly states the rules for meeting them. It was a monumental effort to negotiate it, another great heave to get it ratified by sufficient countries to bring it into force earlier this year.

These talks will be very delicate, as in Kyoto. But now there is a heightened sense of urgency. Climate change science is sending ever more dire and desperate warnings about how long we have to take action. Given that the world is now on an ecological knife-edge, it is vital that the right signals are sent in advance of the Montreal talks. If politicians don't get it right, then the world may well be condemned to climate chaos.

Half-hearted attempt:

There are really difficult issues with China, India and the U.S. But abandoning Kyoto, the only vehicle we have, in a half- hearted attempt to get the U.S. on board seems like a most unwise strategy. The best way to do that is to begin negotiations with the option for U.S. re-engagement after Bush leaves office. As for the big developing countries, no one should expect them to yet take on equivalent targets to the Western nations. That would be unfair and is politically unrealistic. Instead we need to convince them of the development and technology-forcing benefits of a target-led approach.

While the environment suffers more and more stress, global environmental policy is going into reverse. On the issue of climate change, Tony Blair is in the driving seat, and he needs to look where he is going. If he is not careful, he will wreck 15 years' worth of hard-won gains. The stakes are now very high indeed.

Tony Juniper is director of Friends of the Earth.