Statement by Maldives on behalf of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) at the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol
1 December 2015, Paris
Mr. President, Maldives has the honor to speak on behalf of the Alliance of Small Island States, a coalition of 44 low-lying island states and countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.
The recent findings of the structured expert dialogue on the 2013-2015 Review under SBSTA and SBI, underscore what communities on the frontlines of the climate change crisis have known for some time: that the so called "guardrail" of 2 °C is far from safe, and therefore wholly inadequate. Significant climate impacts are already occurring at the current level of global warming and additional magnitudes of warming will only increase the risk of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts. The Review makes it clear that we must scale up and deploy the solutions required to meet the below 1.5°C temperature goal. This means that urgent action is essential.
Mr. President,
This Eleventh session of the CMP comes three years after the end of Kyoto Protocol's first commitment period and three years after agreement on its Doha Amendment. The Parties to the Protocol have invested many years negotiating its second commitment period; we all now need to invest the domestic political capital necessary to bring it into force. If we are sincere in our support for a legally-binding, rules-based regime, we need to bring the second commitment period out of its legal limbo. Parties that have not yet submitted instruments of acceptance should now do so.
In addition, Annex B Parties that have not yet ratified the Doha Amendment should do their utmost to bring forward new, more ambitious commitments at the time of ratification. Many of the conditionalities that have been associated by Annex B Parties with a possible future increase in ambition under the Protocol have now been satisfied and clearly each Party that can do more, should do more.
Further, we all know that some of the Kyoto commitments that have been put forward for attainment in 2020 will be achieved well before that time. We therefore call on all countries with quantified targets listed in Annex B to revisit their commitments with a view to increasing the ambition of these commitments, as provided for in the Doha Amendment.
Mr President,
A finalization of the rule set for the Kyoto Protocol's second commitment period is now well overdue and should be adopted at this session without further delay, in a manner that respects the set of rules agreed in Doha for the environmental integrity of the Protocol. Beneficial rules agreed in Doha include new Article 3.7ter, new eligibility requirements agreed in connection with the mechanisms, restrictions on the carryover and use of surplus units to those Parties that have Annex B commitments for the second commitment period, and cancellation rules. We agreed these rules for very good reasons in Doha and only after extremely lengthy deliberations, and this must not be forgotten.
Mr. President,
AOSIS is also committed to further improving the environmental integrity of the CDM. The ongoing review of the CDM modalities and procedures offers a welcome opportunity to build greater confidence in the CDM as a mitigation tool. One way to do this is by making the CDM's contribution to net mitigation unambiguous, through rules and systems to ensure no double counting of the same emission reductions between host party and investor party.
This review should also be used to consider how the CDM can be used to generate substantial net emission reductions through various combinations of tools, including conservative baselines, discounting CERs upon issuance, shortened crediting periods and voluntary cancellations for the benefit of the environment.
Confidence in the CDM would further benefit from closer scrutiny of certain project categories, and tightened "additionality" requirements.
Success in these areas will be crucial to helping the CDM further contribute to mitigation ambition and to the Convention's overall objective.
Mr. President, we look forward to productive discussions at this session and assure you of our full support.
