Pittsburgh: President of the European
Commission Jose Manuel Barroso has said there can be no
global agreement on climate change without India on board.
"Without India we really cannot do it," Barroso said,
adding that he has been in constant communication with Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and other top Indian leaders in this
regard.
"India will become very soon the biggest country in the
world in demographic terms. It makes no sense to have a global
agreement without India or without China. That`s quite
obvious," he said yesterday in response to a question at the
Council on Foreign Relations, a New York-based think tank.
That is why, he argued, they have been accepting the
principle of shared but differentiated responsibilities, where
the developed countries all should accept targets, binding
targets, and the developing -- even if they are big emerging
economies like India -- should draw up low-carbon development
strategies which will map out concrete actions to limit their
emissions and indicate what is needed.
Barroso said the European countries understand the
sensitivities of India and others about the need to go for
their own development and that they don`t want to block their
economic growth and their development.
"At the same time, being the biggest countries in the
world, I will say that they are the ones who have the biggest
interest in keeping this world a safe place to live for future
generations. So it`s a question of global responsibility,"
Barroso said.
"I mean, it`s quite obvious, because some -- by the way,
some of the leading scientists in this matter are Indian, like
the president of the International Panel on Climate Change,
and they have been the -- some of the strongest advocates of
resolute action in this -- in this field, like Dr Pachauri,"
he noted.
"So we have to make a deal where, of course, the effort
is not the same but that all give a contribution," he argued.
Referring to the European experience, he said: "In some
of our countries in Europe, the less developed countries, we
allowed them to go up with some emission for some years more.
So internally also we made a deal where some have the
possibility to, because of their relatively lower level of
development, to see the growth -- growing their emissions, but
others are making very severe cuts. I think this principle
should be adopted internationally."
So it`s what in the United Nations jargon it is called
the "shared but differentiated" responsibilities, he said.
Bureau Report
