US, India Clash Over Climate Change Remedies
New Delhi - Jul 20, 2009 -- Voice of America News/ContentWorks
U.S.-Indian differences about dealing with global warming were on display
Sunday as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton began talks with Indian
officials in New Delhi. India's environment minister said his country cannot
accept binding limits on carbon emissions under a proposed global climate
change treaty.
The two governments say they want to see an agreement come out of the global
climate change conference in Copenhagen in December.
But comments by senior U.S. and Indian officials, after an informal meeting
on the subject Sunday in a New Delhi suburb, make clear a wide gap remains
between industrialized powers and major developing countries like India on
how to deal with the problem.
The Obama administration supports absolute reductions in greenhouse-gas
emissions by the industrialized nations, and wants emerging economies like
India and China to slow the growth in their atmospheric carbon output by
what are termed "meaningful" amounts. Emission targets for both groups would
be binding.
But after taking Secretary of State Clinton and U.S. climate envoy Todd
Stern on a tour of an environmentally-friendly office tower built with U.S.
support, Indian Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said his government,
though committed to cleaner energy, will not accept specific emission curbs.
"I would like to make it clear and categorical. India's position is that we
simply not in a position to take on legally-binding emission reduction
targets," said Ramesh. "Now, this does not mean that we are oblivious of our
responsibilities for ensuring that the incremental addition to greenhouse
gases that both special envoy Stern, and Madame Secretary of State spoke
about. We are fully conscious of that. Energy efficiency is a very
fundamental driver of our economic strategy."
U.S. climate envoy Stern said 80 percent of world growth in carbon emissions
is coming from fast-growing developing economies like India's and China's
and that a way must be found to put their growth on a "low-carbon path."
But the Indian minister, in a written statement to reporters after an
hour-long meeting with the U.S. team, said even if India's economy continues
to grow at current levels for the next decade or two, its per-capita
emissions would still be well below those of developed countries. He said
there is "simply no case" for the emission-cutting pressure India finds
itself under.
Secretary Clinton sought to downplay differences and called the meeting
fruitful. She said there are more areas of agreement than dispute with
India, and she is confident a strategy can be reached before the Copenhagen
conference that tackles climate change, but does not jeopardize Indian
efforts at poverty-alleviation.
"We believe that economic progress in India is in everyone's interest, not
just India's, to lift people out of poverty and to give every child born in
India a chance to live up to his or her God-given potential is a goal that
we share with you," she said. "But we also believe that there is a way to
eradicate poverty and develop sustainably that will lower, significantly,
the carbon footprint of the energy that is produced and consumed to fuel
that growth."
Clinton said the established economic powers have been the biggest
historical emitters of greenhouse gases and should shoulder the biggest
burden for cleaning up the environment. She said President Barack Obama has
put the United States on a path to do that.
U.S. climate envoy Stern will continue talks with environment minister
Ramesh this week, while Clinton has broader discussions Monday with Indian
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other top officials on bilateral and
regional issues.
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