The High-Level Segment is about to start here in Copenhagen and both Ad Hoc Working Groups, the AWG-LCA and the AWG-KP are closing their business. And it has been a long closing night for the AWG-LCA. After having been delayed many times, the plenary finally started at 1 AM and finished at 6.30 AM, after an intense bracketing session.

Michael Zammit Cutajar, the Chair of the AWG-LCA presented its new package of texts. It consists of a core decision (the 1/CP15) and a bunch of satellite decisions. These satellite decisions cover issues such as: adaptation, a mechanism to register and facilitate the matching of NAMAs and support, REDD-plus, a mechanism for technology development and transfer, and the governance of the financial architecture. All of these satellite decisions contain options, sometimes numerous, as in the case for adaptation or technology, sometimes limited, as far as registry and finance are concerned Yesterday night, these satellite decisions flied pretty easily. But the core decision was vividly discussed.

There has been a dramatic turn of events on this core decision during the past few days. - On Friday Morning, the first version of the Chair of the AWG-LCA proposed 1/CP15 was presented to the contact group. It was then accepted by all, except Japan, as a possible basis for negotiations. Japan said it could not accept the option chosen in the mitigation for developed countries section: an unconditional second commitment period for KP Parties. Other KP Parties had similar concerns, but said they were ready to accept the text as a basis for negotiation. The US said that the overall structure of the mitigation for developed and developing countries was not right, but also said they were ready to accept the text as a basis for negotiation. The developing countries were generally happy with the text, even though they had some specifics remarks.

- On Saturday morning, the Chair of the AWG-LCA organized some informal on the mitigation section of the proposed text. The turn of events probably surprised and disturbed the US. Parties made comments paragraph by paragraph, de facto endorsing the structure of the text, which is not suitable for the US. The US then got frightened.

- On Saturday afternoon, during an informal Ministerial, the US complained about the Chair’s proposed text and asked Connie Hedegaard, Danish Minister of Energy and Climate, and President of the COP15, for immediate political action.

- On Sunday during, it was then decided during a pre COP meeting gathering 48 Ministers that the Presidency of the COP would extract the main political elements of the Chair of the AWG-LCA proposed text and that she would organize Ministerial consultations on these points. The list of issues is the following:

o Aspects of developed country mitigation

  • How to increase aggregate and individual targets
  • How to ensure comparability of efforts among developed countries

o Aspects of developing country mitigation

  • How to register planned actions
  • How to measure report and verify implemented mitigation actions

o Aspects of finance

  • How to set a long term quantified goal on climate finance
  • How to create new sources for climate finance
  • How to measure report and verify climate finance

o Other issues

  • Bunkers
  • Trade

- On Monday and Tuesday, some Ministerial consultations have then benn co Chaired by two Ministers, one of a developed country, one of a developing country, on each of the issues (UK and Ghana on finance etc…). However, these informal did not provide the change of gears that was hoped, mainly because even if they were co Chaired by Ministers, negotiators were intervening from the floor. It was of particular concern for some Parties that consultations were not launched on 1bi but were launched on KP, finance and NAMAs, raising questions about the – favourable – treatment of the US.

- On Monday night, during the closing plenary of the AWG-LCA, developing countries, driven by the big emerging countries (China, India, Brazil and South Africa) have asked for the FULL Chair’s proposed text to be included in the report of the Chair to the COP, not the text MINUS the main political elements. It has therefore been a long night, with the US trying to introduce brackets everywhere in the mitigation section. It was not sufficient for the US to put some brackets at the beginning and at the end of each section. It was willing to underline areas of particular concern. This exercise eventually stops at 6.30 AM on Wednesday morning leaving everybody exhausted.