U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of the Parties 16

By Cathie Adams
Posted December 5, 2010

 

Week #1 at the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of the Parties 16

Discussions the first week of the two-week UNFCCC COP 16 centered around a global taxing scheme and continuation of greenhouse gas commitments beyond the Kyoto Protocol’s expiration in 2012.

Japan fired the first shot across the U.N. bow announcing it “will not inscribe its target in a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol under any conditions or circumstances.” As a result, it received the infamous “Fossil of the Day” recognition from Climate Action Network, a coalition of 500+ radical environmental organizations. Russia and Canada joined Japan, and others are rumored to be considering that option.

Poor nations are demanding the Kyoto extension claiming that rich nations caused “global warming,” therefore they owe reparations to the poor nations. Rich countries on the other hand, 37 of 192 U.N. member states, know that Kyoto’s legally binding greenhouse gas emission limits would devastate their economies.

While wealth redistribution has been somewhat successful through the Kyoto Protocol, it has failed to adequately fulfill the Marxist demand. So, following last year’s grandiose announcement of a $30 billion Fast Start Fund by 2012 and a $100 billion Green Fund by 2020, the U.N. seized the opportunity in Cancun to call for a global tax.

Radical environmentalists at the World Wildlife Fund are pushing the taxing scheme calling for “wealthy and poor governments [to] unite on [a] new source of funding to fight climate change” because it is a key component that would “unlock the financing puzzle at the center of the negotiations” by unlocking “major flows of climate finance.”

The U.N.’s taxing scheme would be unlimited in scope and unlinked from national treasuries. Last month the U.N. Secretary General’s High Level Group confirmed taxes on international shipping and aviation could raise at least $100 billion. The International Maritime Organization would be the tax assessor-collector charging for emission permits and/or fuel taxes. The revenue would be channeled through a fund under the UNFCCC, a scheme the IMO and the UNFCCC are already discussing.

Only the rich nations would pay the taxes; poor nations would receive rebates for their portion of goods shipped.

The bottom line is that the UNFCCC COP 16 has nothing to do with the environment, but everything to do with global taxation. U.N. created Marxist class warfare has succeeded in pitting poor nations against poor nations, now it must convince both that a global tax is the only solution.
Profiting From the Global Taxing Scheme

One of the richest men in the world is so convinced of the imminence of global taxation for the new Climate Fund, that he has already devised a scheme to “eco-label” cargo ships that carry 85% of all goods worldwide, claiming it will align “economic and environmental interests crucial to facilitating needed capital flows.”

The 212th richest man in the world according to Forbes 2010 list of billionaires, Sir Richard Branson, is a British industrialist worth about $4 billion. His new Carbon War Room aims “to support the shipping industry as it moves towards a low-carbon future,” an industry that today is mostly unregulated.

The CWR and its partners launched a website, to be a knowledge hub for the shipping industry to tell an efficient, low-emission ship from an inefficient, heavily carbon-emitting one using the existing International Maritime Organization’s “Energy Efficiency Design Index.” The IMO would be the tax-assessor for the proposed global tax to be levied on international shipping and aviation. The U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change would then channel the money to poor nations.

The CWR’s objective is also to catalyze a market for third-party financing of retrofits for old ships to apply advanced hull coatings, air lubrication systems and even sails to improve efficiency. A spokesman for Papua New Guinea, an island nation, said that the “eco-label” could be used to set port fees and docking priorities for ships.

When asked whether the shipping and aviation industries have been consulted about the new Climate Fund tax, former Ireland president and former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson simply responded, “That is an excellent question…but with focused attention on the continuation of the Kyoto protocol and the establishment of a fair global Climate Fund, we can make Cancun a success.”

Observing U.N. negotiations in Cancun is like watching the movie, Field of Dreams. In the movie, the lead actor hears a voice as he walks through a cornfield saying, “If you build it, he will come.” If the U.N. succeeds in putting rules in place for a second commitment to the Kyoto Protocol and establishment of the Climate Fund, then the necessary momentum is there for next year’s meeting in Durban, South Africa, to realize global taxation.
U.N. Secretary Generals calls for Fundamental Transformation of the Global Economy

Fundamental transformation–where have Americans heard that phrase before? In 2008, candidate Obama promised to “fundamentally transform” America which has resulted in skyrocketing debt and sustained joblessness. We surely do not want that on a global scale!

Yet, that is exactly what U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon called for on Tuesday in Cancun, Mexico, at the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, Conference of the Parties 16: “We need to fundamentally transform the global economy — based on low-carbon, clean energy resources.”

It is toxic to join the phrase “fundamentally transform” with the U.N.’s monotonous call for “low-carbon, clean energy resources.” The meaning is spelled out by the Climate Action Network, a coalition of 500+ nongovernmental radical environmental groups, that demand a ZERO carbon economy by 2050!

Can you imagine the world without fossil fuels to heat and cool our homes and businesses, to run our industries, and to transport people and goods? Undependable energy sources such as solar and wind cannot fill the gap, and radical environmentalists have contempt for nuclear power, even though it produces no carbon dioxide.

The International Panel on Climate Change’s call for reductions of 25-40% below 1990 levels by 2020 seems tempered by comparison, especially when President Obama committed last year to a 17% reduction below 2005 levels by 2020.

But let us not forget what economists and scientists said of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol’s call for a 7% reduction in greenhouse gases below 1990 levels–even 7% would devastate the American economy. All of these demands are based on a theory, not on proven science, that the globe is warming and that arrogant humans could cause the globe to warm.

Even though Clinton-Gore in 1997 agreed to the Kyoto Protocol, they learned it was unworkable. Former President Bush unsigned the Kyoto Protocol, which was never even submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification.

It is doubtful that the new U.S. Senators will approve the radical environmental “cap & trade/tax” legislation, but we can expect President Obama to use executive orders and the bureaucracy at the Environmental Protection Agency to implement his radical agenda; he is already doing that.

A call for compromise is rife among delegations in Cancun, but on Tuesday a “Declaration from the South-South [poor nations] Summit on Climate Justice and Finance” spelled out their impossible demands. They claimed that climate change is “an economic and social crisis, a political crisis, a food and energy crisis, and an ecological crisis.” They called for justice: “climate justice, ecological justice, economic justice, gender justice and historical justice [meaning that they are victims of climate change caused by rich nations].” They concluded their Marxist diatribe chanting, “Let’s globalize the struggle! Let’s globalize hope!”

Todd Stern, America’s head of delegation during this final week’s negotiations, said in a press conference on Tuesday that “an agreement is to be had” by the end of the week. May liberty prevail.

 


U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of the Parties 16 by Cathie Adams

FURTHER MATERIAL:

Ratifying Kyoto at the Local Level: Sovereigntism, Federalism, and Translocal Organizations of Government Actors (TOGAs) – The U.S. Conference of Mayors is a globalist front group. A must read is the chapter in this Yale Law & Economics Research Paper on the U.S. Conference of Mayors as being a translocal transnational organization (see Section 740).

 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email