"Developed Nations Unwilling To Walk The Talk": S Jaishankar On Climate

Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said today that developed nations -- ones that have a huge carbon footprint -- are passing the buck onto other nations without doing their share of emission control. Speaking on climate justice at the India Global Forum in Dubai, the minister, who headlined the event, said the promises made by developed nations at the big climate forums like COP (Conference of Parties) remain unmet.

"Those who are occupying carbon space have kept promising that they would help others. And frankly they have kept shortchanging the world. And they come up every COP with some new argument, some evasion," Mr Jaishankar told the media on Day One of the four-day forum.

"The real problem that you are facing today is the same problem we had multiple COPs ago, which is that the developed countries are still not sincere about keeping their promises... The more climate events and emergencies you have, the more there's going to be the sense that these countries are unwilling to walk the talk," he added.

At times, there are "very clever narratives which are designed to confuse", the minister said.  

"You suddenly will bring up a subject like this country is a big emitter... that country may have per capita emission which is one-tenth that of the rest of the world. But here it will say they are a big emitter so maybe they should step forward. Hello! This is not the country which occupied carbon space. Somewhere people need to be truthful about it and say who's really responsible for global warming and the countries which need to step up," Mr Jaishankar added.

Two years ago, the US had pulled out of Paris Climate Accord -- which aims to stop global warming by cutting emissions and eliminating greenhouse gas pollution -- pointing fingers at India and China.

Then US President Donald Trump had alleged that the Paris Climate Accord, which India had ratified, gave a better deal to "some of the world's highly polluting countries" like India and China and left the US hamstrung.

India, he said, "makes its participation contingent on receiving billions and billions and billions and billions of dollars in foreign aid... China will be allowed to build hundreds of additional coal mines, India will be allowed to double its coal production; we're supposed to get rid of ours," he had said.

India has consistently underscored that the developed nations need to pull their weight regarding emission control.

In 2015, ahead of New Delhi signing the Paris accord, then environment minister Prakash Javadekar had pointed out that actions of developed nations are "far below" than their historical responsibilities and fair shares.