Bangkok--9 Dec--Greenpeace
Activists from Greenpeace, Oxfam and WWF under the umbrella of A-FAB coalition (ASEAN for a Fair, Ambitious, and Binding Global Deal) called on ASEAN delegates at Cancun Climate Conference to stand firmly as a bloc and push forward the interests of the 10-nation group in order to secure the future of the region. ASEAN nations and their rapidly emerging economies are among the most at risk from the global climate crisis -- but they also have the most to gain from a binding international agreement.
A-FAB representatives deployed themselves today in the halls of Moon Palace in Cancun, Mexico, the venue of climate change negotiations to approach and urge the delegates of the 10 member-governments of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to speak up in the negotiations on behalf of the millions of people from the region who are amongst the most affected and least prepared to deal with the vagaries of climate change.
“After one week of slow progress and many disagreements on key issues in the climate change conference, it is clear that delegates of ASEAN governments must take strong positions and push for quick resolution on issues of mitigation and adaptation given the particular vulnerability of our region,” said Zelda Soriano, political advisor of Greenpeace Southeast Asia.
“In negotiations on reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD), for example, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, and other forest countries of ASEAN who will gain from a good REDD deal must speak up. Thesub-national accounting of reduced deforestation in the new text for discussion this week must define sub-national carefully to prevent deforestation from one part of the country to the other, while developed countries can use the reduced deforestation to increase their fossil fuel emissions.” Zelda added
Gia Ibay, climate and energy officer of WWF Philippines points out that this is the opportunity to maximize the advantage of number in a negotiation considering that ASEAN is a group of 10 governments. She said: “A commonASEAN voice that demands for a new Climate Fund under the UNFCCC with defined key elements, process and details that are needed to operationalize the Fund is definitely stronger than one government calling for the same.”
"Agreeing on the need for developed countries to allocate new and additional, public and grant based finance of at least US 100 billion by 2020 to finance mitigation and adaptation. Moreover, there should be provisions for replenishing the global climate funds from the assessed contributions of Annex 1 countries equivalent to 0.5 percentof GDP, to be raised to 1.5 per cent of GDP also by 2020, " said Shalimar Vitan, regional policy coordinator of Oxfam international. “Hence, we expect ASEAN to be a strong advocate for adaptation in the negotiations," she added.