Introduction
On Saturday the biggest event was the climate march. 700 activists travelled to Warsaw from Western Europe by night train to take part on it. The main organizer was the Polish Green party. There were 1200 people all together marching for “Social Justice and Positive Energy for Everyone.” Today on Sunday there has been 60 000 people calling for stronger climate action in Australia.
Furthermore, the closing plenaries of the two subsidiary bodies took place. These two bodies are the SBI (Sub-Sidiary Body for Implementation, responsible for the implementation of decisions and the SBSTA (Sub-Sidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice, responsible for all the in the title mentioned things). If the close, they will forward their decisions to the COP, the Conference of Parties, and the highest decision making body of the UNFCCC. These decisions are mainly drafts for text, which only need to be adopted by the COP. Sometimes, there are crucial issues, which will be discussed further in the second week, which then would be “discussed under the COP”.
Issues covered:
SBI closing plenary
It started at 3pm, was then suspended to 8pm, continued at 10pm and finished at 5:33 am. In SBI closing statements the urgency of building a strong Loss & Damage mechanism was emphasized by YOUNGO, indigenous people and the AOSIS. There was also critique towards CDM and JI by Environmental NGOs and it was noted that they have increased net emissions. The SBI adopted conclusions in Loss and Damage, forwarding the issue to the COP for further consideration, which means, that we hopefully will have a conclusion in the end of the week.
The “Women and Gender”-constituency called for additional funding for the participation in the UNFCCC process.
ADP
During ADP open-ended consultations on the way forward under workstream 2 in the morning, ADP Co-Chair Runge-Metzger stressed the need to focus on concrete outcomes.
Nauru, for AOSIS, and Pakistan called on developed countries to take the lead on mitigation. India and China expressed concern over Annex I countries lowering their level of ambition. Canada said the ambition gap cannot be closed solely by developed countries. Switzerland, Australia and Canada called on parties that have not already done so to submit mitigation pledges.
After many late nights of negotiations, the first week of the conference came to an end, with exhausted delegates leaving the venue early on Sunday morning. In their weariness, some delegates pondered the wider impact of all their work, and many expressed concern over some Annex I parties’ low or reduced mitigation ambition.
SBSTA closing plenary
It started with more than three hours delay at 00:20 at Sunday. Directly after the start, Egypt raised a point of order. ”There was no meeting for Sunday scheduled…and I am really tired, so please close the session”, was the essence of his speech, but the plenary continued.
On FVA, NMM and NMA the wrong drafts were given out. There were big discussions in the sessions about this topic and how to work with this topic. In the every draft has been decided separately.
There was no consensus to continue work during the second week under the COP. Referring to the rules of procedure, the chair said the issue will be considered by SBSTA 40, so the next session of this body. New Zealand, for Australia, Canada, Japan, Kazakhstan, New Zealand, Norway, Ukraine and the US (the main blockers of the negotiations), with the EU and Papua New Guinea, expressed support for asking the COP Presidency to facilitate work on these issues in the coming week. Colombia, for AILAC (Independent Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean states, comprising Colombia, Peru, Costa Rica, Chile, Guatemala, Panama) underlined the need to fulfil the mandate given in Doha, where the last UN Climate Summit took place. Mexico, for the EIG (Environmental Integrity Group; Mexico, Switzerland and Republic of Korea), said specific mandates should prevail over procedural rules. Bolivia, with Nicaragua, Cuba, the Philippines, Venezuela, Malaysia, Angola, for the African Group, China and Senegal, for the LDCs, highlighted the lack of consensus and supported considering the issue at SBSTA 40. Noting lack of consensus, SBSTA Chair Muyungi asked, and countries agreed, to accept his proposal to consider each of the three sub-items at SBSTA 40.
Brazilian proposal: It was not supported by the G77-China group (which Brazil is part of), as it would not send a strong signal from Warsaw on objective and science-based information on historical responsibilities. Brazil regretted that the IPCC has not been requested to provide this information. Developed countries were defensive about this proposal. NGOs hoped this comes from a good intention despite Brazil’s emission increase from deforestation (hope by 28% this year compared to last year). Some NGOs are sceptical about how much time it will take to discuss this issue and a risk of an empty shell deal in 2015 (because of putting numbers on the table in 2017). The SBSTA concluded that no consensus had been reached and the issue could not be discussed at this session.
In the end, Anton gave an intervention on behalf of YOUNGO. It was the last speech for this meeting and the SBSTA closed at 2:56 am.
We then met at the NGO-Party which was awesome and some us went to bed at 5:30am to sleep until 4pm, when it was already dark outside.
Have a nice day,
Your delegation =)