'Forget your nation: fight climate change on behalf of all humanity'

Published on Monday 29 November 2010 18:04

Mexican president Felipe Calderon called on climate negotiators to put national interests aside and act on behalf of all humanity to fight global warming.

Opening a two-week conference in Cancun last night, Mr Calderon urged delegates to overcome the deep divide between rich and poor countries that has hampered efforts to negotiate a new climate treaty for three years.

"It would be a tragedy if our inability to see beyond our personal interests or national interests makes us fail," he said in a speech to 15,000 delegates, businessmen and activists. "The atmosphere is indifferent to the sovereignty of states."

The annual UN conference comes amid mounting evidence that the Earth's climate is already changing in ways that will affect both sides of the wealth divide among nations.

After a disappointing summit last year in Copenhagen, no hope remains of reaching an over arching deal this year setting legal limits on how much major countries would be allowed to pollute.

Such an accord was meant to describe a path toward slashing greenhouse gas emissions by mid-century, when scientists say they should be half of today's levels.

During the talks, delegates hope to conclude agreements that will clear the way to mobilise billions of dollars for developing countries and give them green technology to help them shift from fossil fuels.

The gathering started with renewed warnings from scientists over the failure to act.

"Climate change is the most serious challenge our society has ever confronted," said Mario Molina, a Mexican chemist who won the Nobel Prize in 1995 for his studies on the ozone layer.

The tools were at hand to limit the planet's warming at little cost, but it could mean "astronomical costs for future generations" if nothing was done, he said in the convention's inaugural address.

Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the UN's expert panel on climate change, reminded the delegates of its findings that global warming is "unequivocal" and could lead to "abrupt and irreversible" changes in the Earth's climate system.

Eighty-five countries have made specific pledges to reduce emissions or constrain their growth, but those promises amount to far less than required to keep temperatures from rising to potentially dangerous levels.

The recriminations that followed the Copenhagen summit have raised questions over whether the unwieldy UN negotiations, which require at least tacit agreement from every nation, can ever work.

Adopting scaled back ambitions for Cancun, if successful, could restore confidence in the process.

Christiana Figueres, the top UN climate official, said world capitals were aware of both a growing environmental and political urgency.