At the end of its first week the World Summit is teetering on the brink of failure, with 14 key issues still in dispute and tempers beginning to fray. Delegates are visibly bracing themselves for disappointment next week, when 109 heads of state are expected to arrive in Johannesburg.
In negotiations into the early hours of Friday morning, the European Union (EU) proposed that 14 topics in the draft action plan on which officials had failed to agree should be left to ministers to decide. This, however, has not been accepted by other countries.
The disputed issues included the setting of targets for improving sanitation and increasing renewable energy, which are both opposed by the United States. There is also deep disagreement between the EU and the US on whether arrangements to ensure free trade should overrule agreements to protect the environment.
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According to some reports, this caused the EU delegation to withdraw from talks in the middle of the night. Officials from the British delegation denied that there had been a 鈥渨alk out鈥�, but accepted that EU negotiators had been absent for a short period.
Progress was 鈥渟o damn difficult鈥�, one insider said, that the EU was 鈥渟haking the tree鈥�. A group of environmental and aid groups including Friends of the Earth, Oxfam and WWF (formerly the World Wildlife Fund) are also pulling out of the talks on trade because they are so dissatisfied at the pro-globalisation agenda.
Two agreements
Another issue still in dispute here is the commitment to cut the pollution that causes climate change, agreed in Kyoto in 1997. There are even fears for targets to protect wildlife and the 鈥榩recautionary principle鈥� governing possible environmental damage, which were both agreed at the Earth Summit in Rio ten years ago.
Environmentalists fear that the EU鈥檚 tough overnight stance is a final fling before it submits to an 鈥渁bject compromise鈥�.
Instead of being 鈥楻io plus ten鈥� as it was originally called, the summit could end up as 鈥楻io minus ten鈥�, they say. However this verdict is not accepted by official delegations, which still hope for modest progress.
Jeffrey Sachs, special adviser to the UN secretary, Kofi Annan, was not hopeful. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think it is right to say Rio minus ten, but I do think we are not making the breakthroughs,鈥� he told 快猫短视频. 鈥淚鈥檓 not prejudging the outcome, but I鈥檓 worried.鈥�
Only two agreements have been reached so far in Johannesburg, but both have been dismissed by environmentalists as weak. One is to reduce pollution from toxic chemicals in a way that would 鈥渓ead to the minimisation of significant adverse effects鈥� by 2020. The other is to restore 鈥渨here possible鈥� depleted fisheries by 2015.