The industrialized countries proposed that the developing world should agree to the Australian proposal, which demands all countries, regardless of development levels, take on commitments and fix timetable by when they start reducing emissions. It demands that all key countries, including India, curb their emissions by 2020.

The Indian delegation led by the PM’s special envoy on climate change, Shyam Saran, pointed out that the official negotiations at UN were already grappling with the question of strong mid-term targets for rich nations under the second phase of Kyoto Protocol and to do away with the protocol was not part of the mandate of negotiations. US and some other industrialized countries have for long opposed strong mid-term targets and demanded China and India get on board on a long term agreement.

On the side of MEF meet, the Indian negotiators had to deal with a belligerent John Kerry, head of the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Taking a hard line, Senator Kerry said the provisions in the US domestic bill on climate to impose trade tarrifs on goods imported from countries that don’t agree to emission reductions were like ‘sanctions’ against ‘renegade’ countries that did not sign up to international agreements. India has opposed the provisions, which the Indian government perceives as protectionism hidden in the garb of climate change concerns.

“It’s rather ironic for a US senator to say so after the US backed out of Kyoto Protocol and now finds it politically improbable to pass even an extremely weak domestic legislation on climate change,” said an Indian negotiator.

The attempts by US to throw up completely unacceptable proposals on the table at the last moment with less than three months left for the final round of negotiations in December as well as becoming aggressive on trade barriers is being seen as a ploy to deflect attention from its failure to move ahead on its domestic climate change bill.