8th Jun: What our team's up to9 June 2009
World leaders are at the UN climate talks in Bonn to discuss international solutions to climate change.
Whilst Young Friends of Earth have been carrying out great actions outside the talks our lobby team has kept up the pressure inside the negotiations.
Here's what we've been up to.
Lobbying success
Together with others from across Friends of the Earth International we've met with more than 20 key countries to discuss the issue of offsetting.
Our new report A Dangerous Distraction has provided a great boost for developing countries. It helps their demands to make sure emissions cuts in rich countries are achieved for real.
In official negotiations on targets for industrialised countries the EU was quizzed on their plans to wriggle out of commitments through offsetting.
Developing countries used our report findings to demand real emissions cuts in rich countries of at least 40% by 2020.
Human rights and climate
At the Poznan climate talks in Poland last year we successfully ensured that human rights were added into the negotiations.
Our legal team is now in Bonn to make sure that the talks continue to focus on human rights.
One area of concern is the impact on Indigenous Peoples of damaging proposals to include forests in the offsetting market.
Indigenous people protest at the 2008 Poznan climate talks
The rights of people who depend on forests for their survival must be given a voice in any negotiations to stop deforestation.
The week ahead
By the end of the talks rich countries are supposed to commit to new targets for cutting their emissions for the period starting in 2013.
But as of today this hasn't happened.
Friends of the Earth will continue to push for these targets. Without them the countries most responsible for climate change are simply not living up to their obligations under the Kyoto Protocol.
This will be a strong focus for our lobbying this week so watch this space for further developments.
© Young Friends of the Earth Europe
