Copenhagen: PM's visit not yet clear

With US and French leaders asking Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to attend the Copenhagen Summit on climate change, he is weighing options to participate in the meet where India is expected to strongly pitch for legally binding substantive outcome to deal with the challenge posed to the world.

On his part, Singh told reporters on his way back home after attending the CHOGM Summit in Port of Spain, that he has not made up his mind yet on attending next month's crucial summit. US President Barack Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy had during meetings with Singh suggested that he should take part in the global meet. "I have not decided yet. It is pre-mature to say," Singh said.

After talks with Singh on the sidelines of the just concluded CHOGM summit in Port of Spain, Sarkozy had said, "India has nothing to lose and everything to gain by being in Copenhagen. If India is to be heard, it needs to be present."

According to present plans, environment minister Jairam Ramesh is due to represent India at the summit that will kick off on December 7.

Some 80 presidents and premiers are expected to attend the final days of the conference on December 17-18. Obama might use his December 9 drop-by at the Copenhagen conference on his way to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway to announce a US offer on financing.

Ahead of the meet, India has made it clear that there was no question of taking any binding carbon emission cuts. It has also indicated that there will be a coordinated approach among emerging economies including Beijing and New Delhi.

"There cannot be any emission cuts. . . that is what we have said and this is also which is something what the developed countries have said," the pointsman on climate change Shyam Saran said.

"That they (industrialised nations) don't expect countries like India, actually to sign on to emission reduction target but rather to sign to a deviation from business as usual," he said.

Saran's views came after India and China along with other developing nations forged a common front to put pressure on the developed nations at the UN summit.

He dismissed notions that there was any pressure on India to take on legal emission cuts at the forthcoming meet and instead referred to various voluntarily steps taken by it whether it was in terms of renewable energy or improvement in energy efficiency.

Heated debates are expected to dominate the summit with developing nations coming with their own draft to pre-empt developed nations' likely move to insist on binding carbon emission cuts.

"What China and India besides other key developing nations have done is consolidating their position anchored in the UN Framework on Convention on Climate Change," a senior official said.

The countries had said they had reached an agreement on major issues, including the need for the West to provide finance and technology to help developing nations combat global warming.

"But still, we have shown our intention to be flexible, for instance ready to report and verify mitigation action in case they are backed by requisite finance and technology," he added.

The prime minister had said that 'India is willing to sign on to an ambitious global target for emission reduction or limiting temperature increase if it is accompanied by an equitable burden-sharing paradigm.'

Image: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh