Dear delegates:Yesterday CAN was scheduled to deliver a 2 minute statement at the opening of the SBI. Regrettably (to CAN at least), the Chair decided under his own authority that there were not 2 minutes left available in the session for the delivery of that statement. So you never got to hear it. For your information, here it is:
SBI-36 OPENING STATEMENT
CAN-INTERNATIONAL
Thank you, Chair. Good evening dear delegates and colleagues.
Firstly, Chair, CAN wishes you all the best in the task ahead of you in what promises to be yet another challenging year for the SBI.
On specific items this session, we would like to briefly highlight three particularly important issues for CAN:
Firstly, on capacity building, the establishment of the Durban Forum was one small step taken last year towards recognising the critical need for Parties to agree on scaled up and coordinated action on capacity building. The vast majority of developing countries fully understand the benefits of low-carbon development, how it can benefit their sustainable development and poverty alleviation objectives and how it will allow their emissions to deviate from a business as usual baseline. Ways to address their current lack of capacity to even commence this task need to be urgently agreed. CAN looks forward to participating in the Forum next week and to working with you, Chair, and with Parties towards scaling up the implementation of 2/CP-7.
Secondly, on arrangements for inter-governmental meetings, CAN has no need to remind delegates of the scale of the task involved in ensuring coherence between the seven negotiating tracks scheduled for Doha. The confluence of those tracks has to be a framework for both vastly scaled up mitigation effort between now and 2020, and a robust workplan to deliver a new and fully comprehensive legally binding agreement by 2015 at the latest.
In the same item, the subject of NGO participation is of course a vital matter for CAN. Progress we thought the SBI had secured this time last year has been more than somewhat degraded since, with Parties continuing to conduct the real substance of the negotiations away from the eyes and ears of civil society. In at least one case in Durban the final "open" informal meeting was in fact just 5 minutes long. Civil society observers therefore had no opportunity whatsoever to contribute to the outcome, or even to be able to comment on it. This was not the spirit of last year's SBI decision as CAN understood it.
Thirdly, on appeals against decisions of the CDM Executive Board, Parties must uphold the principle that the right to information, the right to public participation, and the right to seek justice are intrinsic to every individual and are inherent human rights. Access to justice for all local and global stakeholders including project-affected peoples and communities must be ensured. Thank you.
