Hit the ground running… but where to?
Posted on 03. Nov, 2009 by Rosa Kouri in Canada
After my eventful trip, I finally made it to Barcelona at 9:00 this morning. Managed to make time for a quick shower at the hostel, and headed straight to the conference. Through security, through accreditation, photos taken for my badge, and I was back in the thick of UN negotiations. Getting my bearings is surprisingly hard. Just what exactly is going on here?
I arrived and half the talks were suspended. Supposedly, a group of African nations had already walked out because the rich countries were not taking their survival seriously. This was a direct shot at the United States for not using their breakthrough power to push for ambitious science-based targets. It’s unclear whether or not Canada was targeted in this debacle. But as a fellow major emitter, Canada has been decidedly MIA on the ambitious front.
Yesterday, Canada won a Fossil of the Day Award, the dubious recognition given to the country that does the most to obstruct the climate negotiations. Canada winning a fossil is nothing new these days – but this time they won beside Denmark, a country normally recognized for its good behaviour.
Today, Canada won another Fossil, for giving the impression that they want an unnecessarily narrow definition of the global warming impacts eligible for adaptation funding. So far, it’s unclear what their position really is on this – I’ll try to find out in the next few days.
In the midst of all these fuzzy signals, hopefully we can take some mess out of this madness. We met with Michael Martin, Canada’s lead negotiator, and I’m excited to talk to him about the talks. We do know there are over twenty Canadian government delegates at this conference. I for one am particularly interested in finding out what they’re up to, and I’ll be asking lots of questions. We’ve got high hopes for our delegation here, and I’m sure they’re hard at work.
If you have any particular questions for them, please let me know and I’ll pass them on.
Much love from Barcelona,
Rosa Kouri