The United States is warning that the Cancun climate summit could collapse over the refusal of a few countries, including Canada, to renew the Kyoto Protocol.
At a news conference on Tuesday, chief U.S. negotiator Todd Stern said the United-Nations-sponsored talks are in peril as countries have failed to make much progress in key areas of U.S. concern.
With three days left, Mr. Stern said negotiators could still reach "building blocks" agreements that will lead to a binding treaty at a meeting in South Africa next year. But he said the United States will not agree to an "unbalanced" outcome just to avoid a stalemate.
"I do think there is an agreement to be had … but there are a lot of difficulties, so we will have to see," he said.
One of the most contentious issues is the future of the Kyoto Protocol, which set binding targets for 37 industrialized countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas emissions an average of 5 per cent against 1990 levels over the period 2008-2012.
Federal Environment Minister John Baird, who arrived in Cancun on Tuesday, has said Canada wants one agreement that would bind all major emitters to reductions, although at different levels. Along with Russia, Canada has refused to indicate whether it will make new commitments under Kyoto after 2012, while Japan has ruled it out. The European Union and developing countries want a new Kyoto deal plus a parallel agreement that would include the United States.
Mr. Baird's spokesman, Bill Rodgers, said Tuesday that "it only makes sense" that large emitters like the United States, China, India and Brazil have binding commitments under a single treaty.
Mr. Stern said it would be a "terrible shame" to lose whatever progress negotiators were able to make due to an impasse over Kyoto. "You'd hate to lose that because [the talks] crashed over the Kyoto Protocol," he said.
He added the battle over Kyoto is affecting the overall talks, diverting negotiators' time, energy and focus from other issues. "There is an uncertainty, which is affecting the tenor and mood of the conference," he said.
The United States is not involved in the Kyoto discussions, but plenty of other issues stand in the way of reaching the kind of agreements that the Obama administration can bring to an increasingly skeptical Congress with a newly elected Republican majority in the House of Representatives.
Many Republican leaders oppose any UN climate deal that would require the United States to provide financing and technology transfers to developing countries.
But in Cancun, many delegations are wary of U.S. promises – having seen the Americans help forge the original Kyoto deal and then fail to ratify it, and make ambitious promises at Copenhagen talks last year, only to see Congress fail to pass a climate bill.
Mr. Stern insists the United States can meet its target of reducing emissions by 17 per cent from 2005 levels by 2020. President Barack Obama has promised to force industry to cut emissions through regulations instead of legislation – a move Canada says it intends to match. But the President faces political and court challenges to his plan to use to Environmental Protection Agency for the purpose.
Other countries simply don't believe the United States can meet its targets, ratify a treaty and deliver promised financial commitments.
"They're walking around naked, acting like the emperor," said Graham Saul, executive director of the Canadian Climate Action Network.
The United States says it wants a "balanced" set of agreements to emerge from the Cancun talks that would commit developed countries to finance emission reductions and adaptation in poor nations, but also bind major developing countries to rein in emissions and allow international monitoring.
At his news conference, the U.S. negotiator said countries have made good progress in talks on financing and technology transfers – areas in which the developed world will shift resources to developing countries – but far less movement in getting major developing countries like China and India to commit to binding emissions targets and allow transparency and international oversight so they meet their commitments.
Mr. Stern reacted coolly to a report that China is willing to include its voluntary emissions targets in a treaty and pass legislation to make them binding.
"That doesn't seem to be anything new to me," he said. "I would love it to be a game changer, but it looks to me like business as usual."
And Mr. Stern made it clear the United States is prepared to see the Cancun meeting declared a failure rather than make concessions to developing countries on the basis of vague promises from major emitters like China and India.