China defends role in climate talks

BEIJING, Dec. 23 (UPI) -- China struck back Tuesday at British accusations that Beijing "hijacked" the Copenhagen climate-change talks.

"The statements from certain British politicians are plainly a political scheme," Jiang Yu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said in a statement issued by the state-run Xinhua news agency. China's stance was an apparent response to an article Monday in The Guardian by British Secretary of State for Climate and Energy Ed Miliband, critical of China's role in the Dec. 7-19 talks.

In the article, Miliband said China -- the world's largest emitter of carbon -- vetoed agreement on including the need for large reductions in emissions by 2050 in the accord, despite support for those targets from a coalition of developed countries and a vast majority of developing countries.

"We did not get an agreement on 50 percent reductions in global emissions by 2050 or on 80 percent reductions by developed countries. Both were vetoed by China, despite the support of a coalition of developed and the vast majority of developing countries," wrote Miliband, who played a crucial role in the Copenhagen negotiations.

"We cannot again allow negotiations on real points of substance to be hijacked in this way," he added.

Jiang said the objective of the British politicians "is to shirk the obligations of developed countries to their developing counterparts and create discord among developing countries, but the attempt is doomed to fail."

"Miliband's comments could be the start of a flurry of buck-passing," said Lin Boqiang, director of Xiamen University's China Center for Energy Economics Research, China Daily reports.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Monday he rejected British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's suggestion that he would lobby the United States and other EU members to commit to deeper emissions reductions on condition that China pledged to do more. Wen said he refused the request because China is still a developing country with 15 million people struggling in poverty.

"China wants to exert newly found superpower status, and its leaders know that they need to show leadership in cutting emissions," Abyd Karmali, the global head of carbon markets for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, told The New York Times.

"On the other hand, the Chinese leadership needs to satisfy a domestic constituency that believes the historical burden for emissions has little to do with them, that there is no need to constrain its economic development, and that there is certainly no need to show much deference to other countries," he said.