Letters: A disappointment

With reference to Sunita Narain's column, "Paris: The endgame for climate justice" (December 21), the climate change agreement signed in the French capital has more misses than hits.

The pact does not ensure that targets are legally binding on finance or emissions. Though developing countries such as India have got financial support in the form of $100 billion annually, but the pact conveniently removes historical responsibility for developed countries. Although developed countries do not agree, but they are the ones largely responsible for climate change in the past decade or so.

For the global temperature to be down by two degrees, the quantity of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere needs to be reduced nearly to pre-industrial era levels. To achieve this, drastic measures would be required by all countries, especially the developed ones, but they have extricated themselves from this task.

India's environment minister, Prakash Javadekar, summed it up quite well when he said that although 196 countries had adopted the Paris agreement, it could have been more ambitious in its target and that developed nations were far removed from their historic responsibilities. Narain has rightfully called the agreement a disappointment.

Bal Govind Noida

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