The Copenhagen climate summit is in disarray:

Developing countries react furiously to leaked draft agreement that would hand more power to rich nations, sideline the UN’s negotiating role and abandon the Kyoto protocol

The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray today after developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN’s role in all future climate change negotiations.

The document is also being interpreted by developing countries as setting unequal limits on per capita carbon emissions for developed and developing countries in 2050; meaning that people in rich countries would be permitted to emit nearly twice as much under the proposals.

The so-called Danish text, a secret draft agreement worked on by a group of individuals known as “the circle of commitment” – but understood to include the UK, US and Denmark – has only been shown to a handful of countries since it was finalised this week.

The agreement, leaked to the Guardian, is a departure from the Kyoto protocol’s principle that rich nations, which have emitted the bulk of the CO2, should take on firm and binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gases, while poorer nations were not compelled to act. The draft hands effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank; would abandon the Kyoto protocol – the only legally binding treaty that the world has on emissions reductions; and would make any money to help poor countries adapt to climate change dependent on them taking a range of actions.

As everyone keeps saying, it’s all about science; politics has nothing to do with it. Not to worry, the private jets are still flying in, the limo companies are doing a booming trade, Danish prostitutes are busy, as are Anglican bell ringers and Dan Brown has the title for his next novel: The Circle of Commitment.

Al Gore is writing climate poetry. Its overall effect is much the same as that of Vogon poetry (the 3^rd worst poetry in the universe – Al Gore’s being the 4^th worst).

Here are some excerpts:

One thin September soon
A floating continent disappears
In midnight sun

Vapors rise as
Fever settles on an acid sea.

……

Snow glides from the mountain
Ice fathers floods for a season
A hard rain comes quickly

Then dirt is parched
Kindling is placed in the forest
For the lightning’s celebration

…….

The shepherd cries
The hour of choosing has arrived
Here are your tools

This reminds me that it’s back to the 60’s for the Copenhagen Climate Conference: the theme song is Bob Dylan’s A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall. Between that and Al Gore reading his poetry, delegates will be running from the auditorium shrieking and clutching their heads.