Milibands sound Copenhagen alarm
By Alex Stevenson
David and Ed Miliband have warned there is a “real danger” this December’s crucial climate change talks in Copenhagen will fail.
Speaking at a briefing for journalists at the Foreign Office this lunchtime, foreign secretary David Miliband suggested there was only a 50 per cent chance of agreement being reached later this year.
The Copenhagen talks are set to establish the successor deal to the Kyoto protocols, which are due to expire in 2012.
Ed Miliband, as energy and climate change secretary, is leading the British negotiations but has drafted in brother David to engage other European Union officials on the issue.
The foreign secretary is conducting a whistlestop tour of European cities this week to call for unity on climate change talks. EU nations have already pledged to a 20 per cent cut in carbon emissions by 2020 but will only increase this to 30 per cent if an “ambitious global deal” is reached.
“There is a lot to play for,” David Miliband added. “We’re not on a seamless, straightforward road to a deal. We’re worried.
“There is a danger these negotiations won’t succeed. There is a danger people won’t wake up to the problem until it’s too late.”
Ed Miliband sounded a less alarmist note, saying that since he came to office a year ago many countries had made progress.
He flagged the new Japanese government’s announcement, made yesterday, that it would commit to cutting its emissions by a quarter by 2020 as a welcome example.
“The reason David’s diplomatic mission is so important is we need to act urgently on the climate change proposals,” he said.
“It feels as if many of the jigsaw pieces are in place for a deal and it is our job to put them together… this is too complex a deal to be brokered at three o’clock in the morning on the last night.”
