Katowice meltdown: Switzerland calls India, Africa Group proposals 'crappy'

Switzerland apologises as tempers frayed between countries gathered in Katowice for talks on tackling climate.

As the climate talks reached a frenetic pace on Wednesday, tempers frayed. In a rather undiplomatic spat at a ministerial-level meeting, Switzerland told India and the Africa Group of Nations that their proposals on climate finance were “crappy”. The intemperate language from the country, part of the Environmental Integrity Group, got both India and the Africa Group of Nations responding to the affront and Switzerland apologising later. 

Through the day, WhatsApp groups of developing country groups were constantly inundated with messages from their diplomats trying to coordinate positions and responses across dozens of rooms that had opened up to minister-level consultations. With developing country groups comprising a larger number of nations, but with smaller delegations and lesser capacity, coordination between them turned into a challenge as negotiations entered the last phase. 

A third iteration of the draft rule book was expected in the day but only some pieces of it were made public. Business Standard reviewed some of the others on which some progress had been made but the trickiest bit remained within brackets, requiring trade-offs across sections of the rule-book that would take place only with minister-level approvals between Wednesday and Friday.  “There are ministerial level negotiations now on every part of the rule-book. It is at a pace we should have seen earlier in the week but this is good. We are beginning to reach the point from where ministers can start to figure the super-red lines of the groups and countries,” said one developing country negotiator who is involved in climate finance-related issues. 

Super red-lines refer to positions and concerns that groups or countries are unwilling to trade-off or see deleted any cost. 

A breach of these red-lines can lead to groups or countries veto the entire result of the talks. 

The talks are based on consensus of all countries and groups. Therefore, the hosts and the facilitators are always wary of breaching these super red-lines. 

Developing country groups expressed a degree of satisfaction that their positions and proposals had been put on the table in most cases but continued to be vary that because they remain within bracket they could be easily dropped during the ministerial consultations if they do not remain vigilant. 

At the time of writing the report the ministers put in charge of specific parts of the rule-book by the Polish presidency had begun consultations in groups as well as bilaterals to sort differences. The talks, multiple negotiators said, were likely to continue through the late night and in some cases stretch through the night as well, just as they had over the past two as it snowed outside the convention centre at Katowice. 

Some contentious concerns that were yet to see any convergence between country groups:

1. Markets

What would be the nature of global carbon markets that are set up under the Paris Agreement. A proposal from Brazil on the way ahead saw many countries including developing and developed not agreeing to different bits on it. 

2. Compliance

What happens when countries fail to comply with the provisions of the rulebook and the Paris Agreement? Would developed countries and developing countries undergo the same compliance process and face the same level of consequences for non-compliance with the transparency rules of the Paris Agreement?

3. Talanoa Dialogue and the UN General Assembly

Will the quasi-official dialogue conclude at Katowice as planned? Or, will it be linked to a special session of the UN General Assembly planned next year where the countries could be forced to ratchet up just their mitigation targets for the first phase of Paris Agreement starting 2020. The UN Secretary General has appointed a special envoy to lobby for this ahead of the summit at New York to convince countries to get on board this ratcheting up.

4.  1.5 degree celsius IPCC report

How does the report get a formal acknowledgement under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. The report authors went beyond their brief and commented on the first round of Paris Agreement targets. It also has a deeper focus on mitigation and lacks comprehensive assessment on how much finance and technology transfer is required to keep temperature rise below 1.5 degree celsius. Yet, the report has become the corner-stone of public debate as well as climate change groups from Europe. Some nations, such as the LDC Group want to see it to trigger formal talks within the UN Convention on what more needs to be done to fight climate change. Others are concerned that the end result of consultations would also be mitigation-centric and not balanced owing to the tilt in the underlying report.