India's image as deal spoiler at Paris has changed: Source

India's negative image of a "spoiler" at the climate change conference here is changing for the better, even though contentious issues like financing by developed nations still remain on the table, a negotiator at the Paris summit said today.

"During the week, the negotiations have occurred on all the elements. Key issues including Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) process, the differentiation process and the financing part, all of these are still to be resolved. India is expected to take up all these issues," the negotiator from a developing country said while giving perspective about India after the week-long negotiations.

The negotiator, on condition of anonymity said that India is very much in the middle of the process, but the good thing is that the negotiations are still going on.

"The good thing is negotiations are still going on. Obviously there are points of view which are different but the negotiations continue," he said.

The negotiator also expressed surprise that the Paris conference started with a negative perception of India as a "deal blocker" and a coal user.

"It took India a lot of explaining and a lot of discussions with various countries, groups, NGOs and civil societies to put forward what it wants to do. To tell them that India is here to negotiate and get an agreement that it is pushing for renewables.

"It took an entire week to address this issue. We are now finding that the tone is hopefully changing for the better. The dialogue process with all partners should continue and there is hope that there will be resolution of a number of issues next week," the negotiator said.

The contentious issues which has been raised by India and which still remain are positioning of the agreement visa-a-vis the convention, while the second is the process by which INDC becomes Nationally Determined Mitigation Commitment (NDMCs).

The negotiator said the third issue is related to transparency although much progress has been achieved on that.

Fourth is the mechanism for global stock taking and updating of INDCs. The global stock taking is in view of a global aggregate of the commitments that nations have made.

"Mitigation, adaptation and means of implementation - that is what India would like. There is an emerging consensus but the only issue in this particular thing is once one has taken stock, how does it influence the update of INDCs.

"While India believes it will influence the next INDC's, others believe that its updation should occur even on the existing INDC," the negotiator said, adding while financing is an issue which remains "deeply divided", the last issue is of technology.
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"There will be key technologies which will enable both mitigation and adaptation. Mitigation in the sense of the need for affordable storage technologies which allow a greater number of renewables to be in the grid.

"The challenge is how do we make it happen. A solar alliance has being formed. We have seen mission innovation which is about research and development. These kinds of initiatives are good, but they also need to be hooked into the convention," the negotiator said.

Asked what was the positive outcome of the negotiations, the negotiator said that India has been able to work in a constructive spirit and the negative perception of India has been changed.

However, the fact that there are still some kinds of economic conditions regarding financing is a bit disturbing, he added.