Brazil wants rich countries to renew Kyoto commitments

Brazil said Monday it would press rich countries attending climate change talks in South Africa to renew their commitments to cut greenhouse gas emissions under the Kyoto protocol. A 12-day round of talks under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) got underway in Durban Monday under a process launched under the 1992 Rio Summit. "At the center of all is the second period of commitments under the Kyoto protocol," said Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota. Signed in 1997, the Kyoto Protocol saw most developed nations agree to legally binding commitments on curbing their greenhouse gas emissions that are blamed for global warming. Those commitments are due to exire at the end of 2012 and, if there is to be a second round of legally binding pledges, they would need to be made at the Durban meeting. "The protocol is an essential tool in the fight against climate change and its extension is necessary to maintain a high level of ambition" in the negotiation outcome, Patriota said in an official statement. He added that Brasilia would not accept rich countries stepping back to "lower levels of commitments." The United States, the world's biggest polluter, never signed up to the Kyoto Protocol. Russia, Canada and Japan ratified the original agreement but have indicated they will not sign up to an updated protocol if the United States and major emerging nations such as China do not. Brazil said the level of commitment by developing countries would depend on what happens in Durban. Developing countries, including China, did not have to commit to cutting emissions as part of the Kyoto Protocol and most of them maintain this should remain the case. Brazil said it planned to coordinate its stance with its partners in the BRICS group of emerging nations -- Russia, India, China and South Africa -- as well as with the group of 77 and China which brings together 130 nations. Meanwhile Kiyo Akasaka, the UN under secretary-general for communications and public information, said on a visit to Rio that he was "pessimistic' about the outcome of the Durban talks. "The United States are outside the protocol and Canada will not meet its targets," he noted. "How can they agree with the essence of the Kyoto protocol?" "I can be very pessimistic about Durban but civil society, the media should put pressure and I don't see pressure from the people, from the business community, from academic circles." Akasaka made the comments in Rio as he launched a UN campaign to mobilize civil society for a global conversation via the Internet and social networks on what kind of future people want in their cities and villages 20 or 40 years from now, "before it is too late."