Obama to meet Modi at Paris climate talks

“The ACP Group stresses the need for developed parties to honour their commitments to support developing countries including mobilising US$100 billion in climate change finance per annum by 2020, as well as urge donors that have not yet done so, to conclude contribution agreements with the Green Climate Fund”.

Ahead of the Paris Climate Change Conference, top sources in the Environment Ministry said, “India would not be bullied into accepting the position of the developed countries”. Officials there reacted angrily after Secretary of State John Kerry said in an interview last week with the Financial Times that the nation posed a “challenge” for the Paris talks.

While in Paris, the president also will meet with the leaders of island nations facing some of the harshest effects of global warming.

“Each country should deliver what they have promised, which is the basic foundation of political trust”, Xie said, adding that mutual trust is a prerequisite to a successful conference.

“These two countries are two of our most important partners in dealing with global climate change”, Bodnar said noting Obama has had a number of engagements with the two leaders over the course of this year.

“This plan identifies concrete steps that African governments can take to ensure that their countries will not lose hard-won gains in economic growth and poverty reduction, and they can offer some protection from climate change”. India has been pressing for more money and technology transfers from wealthy countries to developing ones. “What a powerful rebuke to the terrorists it will be when the world stands as one and shows that we will not be deterred from building a better future for our children”, Mr Obama said at a White House news conference on Tuesday. Some also say Mr. Obama’s promises ultimately may fall to legal challenges and stiff bipartisan resistance in the U.S.

Negotiators from almost 200 countries will converge in Paris to hammer out a global pact to reduce the world’s emissions to prevent the average global temperature from rising beyond 2 degrees C. Scientists believe global warming beyond that level is likely to exacerbate current trends in extreme weather events, sea-level rise, droughts and water stress in different parts of the world leading to wide-ranging adverse impacts on crops, economies and human society. “We expect Paris to produce equitable and just climate agreement where the development space for developing world should be assured”.

But the world’s poor countries have put the first world on notice that they will not approve a new agreement until significant climate financing is in place.