The Paris Climate Talks and the Failure of States
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- Published on Tuesday, 03 March 2015 20:00
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin .... No. 1087 .... March 4, 2015
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The Paris Climate Talks and the Failure of States
Gabriel Levy
The officials in charge of the United Nations climate talks say that no deal will be done in Paris in December (COP21) to avoid dangerous global warming. After preparatory negotiations in Geneva, Switzerland, this month, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), confirmed that the target set previously, of limiting warming to 2 degrees centigrade above pre-industrial levels, would be missed. Figueres had already said, in December, after a round of talks in Lima, Peru, that "the sum total of efforts [in Paris] will not be able to put us on the path for two degrees. [...] We are not going to get there with the Paris agreement... ... We will get there over time." This month she reiterated that the Paris talks would only "set the pathway for an orderly planned transition over time to a low-carbon society."
The EU climate commissioner, Miguel Arias Canete, claimed that "you cannot say it is a failure" if, collectively, the world's governments abandoned the 2 degrees target, as long as there is "an ongoing process."
