COP21 head presents final draft of climate talks outcome

PARIS — The 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) on Saturday presented the final draft outcome of the climate talks to negotiators of 196 countries.

“The draft final outcome submitted to you this morning and which will be distributed at the end of this meeting obviously owes a great deal to the progress made here in Paris,” COP21 President Laurent Fabius told delegates.

The translated text, which has reportedly been reduced further in terms of pages, will be released to the delegates at 1:30 p.m. (Paris time).

UPDATE: Full text of draft outcome released

“It is my deep conviction that we have come up with an ambitious and balanced agreement which reflects the (views) of the parties,” Fabius said after the Comite de Paris was convened on Saturday noon in this city.

“This text which is necessarily a balanced text contains the principle elements that we feel or did feel before would be impossible to achieve,” he said during the opening speech, which was warmly accepted by the negotiators.

He described the draft as agreement “differentiated, fair, durable, dynamic and legally binding.”

While he did not discuss the details of the document, Fabius said it will contain the target of “a mean temperature well below 2 degrees and to endeavor to limit that increase to well below 1.5 degrees.”

There will also be an “update of every five years of national contribution.”

Green lines

Fabius said that while initially every country wanted 100 percent of its “wishlist” fulfilled, it wouldn’t have resulted in progress.

“We need to show the world that our collective effort is worth more than the sum of our individual actions,” he said. “The time has come to focus not on the red lines but on green lines for universal commitment. The aim is not just to push for our individual positions but to hope for general balance.”

Fabius gave his final plea to the negotiators, who will decide on whether to accept or reject the COP21 outcome.

He mentioned the plight of island countries that are vulnerable to sea level rise and the support needed by Latin American countries to protect their forests.

“It would help all of us to build resilient development with low carbon emissions based on sustainable lifestyles,” he explained, adding that it will also serve other causes like food security, public health and combatting poverty.

Borrowing United Nations Secretary Ban Ki-moon’s words, Fabius said there seems to be a “kind of planetary configuration” this year, compared to the Copenhagen negotiations, which was a failure.

“Nobody here wants a repetition of what happened in Copenhagen,” he said.

“In this room you are going to be deciding upon a historic agreement. The world is holding its breath. It counts on all of us,” he said.

Country delegates will have to study the text and take note of provisions that have reservations with. The COP21 plenary will then be convened and each country will have the opportunity to respond and announce if they accept or reject the outcome.

The international community has long been waiting for a legally binding agreement to address climate change. If the outcome is accepted, it will put into play various measures to promote clean energy and to ensure that the rise in global temperature is limited.