Planetativo

COP 17 in Durban ends with a promise: to sign a global treaty to reduce carbon emissions. The deadline to enforce the treaty is 2020.

It has taken two weeks of intensive talks and overtime to produce a document that postpones the problem for the future: the Durban Platform. The document includes the continuation of the previous  Kyoto Protocol agreement and the creation of the Green Climate Fund. The fund will help poorer countries adapt to climate change while preserving tropical forests and developing clean energy technologies. What remains to be seen is determining where the money will come from.

The plan is to work for an agreement to address climate change by 2015 and make it operational in 2020. All countries, even the undeveloped will have to cut their carbon emissions. This is the first time that all nations commit to a global agreement within  the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. It has been an important decision because scientists from some countries, like Russia, insist in  denying global warming and scientific evidence from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC.

The United Nations represents the interests of all countries and human beings on this planet, our home. These interests should prevail over political or economic ambitions of each country. Young people and children all over the world are entitled to live in a planet without climate chaos. This is a promise that must be fulfilled. The sooner,the better.