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For release: November 9, 2006

Nairobi Conference on Climate Change

Canada’s position hypocritical, Canadian environmental groups say

(Nairobi) Canadian environmental groups express concern today over Canada’s negotiating position at the UN Climate Change Conference in Nairobi. Group representatives believe Canada’s position to be fatally flawed on at least two counts and to be counterproductive to the ongoing crucial international talks focusing on the new phase of the Kyoto Protocol.

Groups believe rapidly industrializing developing countries such as China, India and Brazil should accept stronger commitments but it is hypocritical of Canada to insist they take on absolute emission reduction targets, while Canada has abandoned its own commitments under the first phase of the Protocol.

“Who are we to tell developing countries to reduce their emissions, while we are abandoning our own international obligations? “ says Steven Guilbeault, from Greenpeace. “In order for these countries to take us seriously and start making some form of commitment, we have to show demonstrable progress. We have to be credible”.

“By demanding large developing countries to commit to reduction targets at this stage, before industrialized countries can clearly show that they are meeting their targets under the first phase of the Protocol, Canada also risks antagonizing developing countries as a whole and derailing negotiations” underlines Morag Carter, David Suzuki Foundation.

“Canada’s position is especially shaky since it has failed so far to abide by one of its obligations under the Protocol and submit to the United Nations an important report showing ‘demonstrable progress’ in meeting its Kyoto objectives,” maintains Emilie Moorhouse, Sierra Club of Canada.

Groups also believe that Canada underestimates the importance of setting very strict timelines to these negotiations. “Time is not on our side,” says Hugo Séguin, from Montreal-based Equiterre. “The impacts of climate change are becoming increasingly clear and the need for action is ever more pressing,” he added.

Groups believe Canada should commit to setting a clear deadline for the talks on the second phase of the Protocol and are proposing 2008 as an end date that would allow enough time for countries to ratify the agreement and provide businesses with long term certainty on the rules that will be applied to them in the coming years.

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