The stock taking of the progress of the spin-off groups for various articles of the Non-Paper was convened on Wednesday under the ADP contact group. Four spin-off groups negotiated on proposals, known as articles, under the Non-Paper or the draft text for the Paris climate deal. While the first spin-off group negotiated on covering capacity building and technology deployment and transfer, the second group was convened for Work Stream II, a process aimed at enhancing pre-2020 climate ambition till the Paris Agreement comes into force.The third spin-off has been negotiating on mitigation while the fourth spin off group handled finance. These spin off groups are targeted groups aimed at negotiating for specific articles of the non-paper.
Reporting about progress of the group, co-facilitator Artur Runge-Metzger said that for technology deployment and transfer, the focus of the group was on cooperative action. For capacity building, parties had deliberated more about missing elements related to commitments and responsibilities of the developed countries and also their support to domestic institutional mechanisms.
Likewise, report on Work Stream II group’s performance talked of introduction of new proposals captured in the text. In a major development in themitigation group, parties were given an option to include changes in the text and the revised text was published thereafter. However, it was reported that time constraints were leading to disappointment among Parties.
On finance, parties worked on core issues, including institutional arrangements and “ex-ante information of finance in informed settings”. Owing to time constraints, the groups also agreed to have organised offline discussions outside the time frame of scheduled time.
Noting the slow progress of the groups, French Ambassador Laurence Tubiana, in her capacity of incoming presidency for the Paris negotiations, expressed concerns over slow pace of negotiations considering that there were less than three days left in the discussions that were a run-up to the Paris negotiations. Amidst rumours in the corridors of an alternative plan of action in case the current process fails, the ambassador clarified that there was “No Plan B”. She urged the Parties for meaningful engagements and negotiations to reach to compromise and bridging proposals for an agreed outcome before Paris negotiations begin.
In a significant note, South Africa, on behalf of G-77 and China, reminded the delegates of the critical phase of negotiations in Bonn. It also put forward a proposal that included the points:same mode of methodology to be adopted by all the spin-off groups, mandate to co-facilitators as heading the spin-off group to streamline the texts, an opportunity to parties to put missing concrete proposals to be captured in the text and a separate spin-off group on the preambular section of the Non-Paper or draft text. A decision on this proposal would, however, be taken later in the day.
In another significant development the previous day, civil society and NGOs had been barred from attending the spin-off groups and can now take part only in the contact groups meetings convened by the co-chairs.
