The
delegates are under the umbrella of an amalgam of civil society organisations
from Africa, Europe, Asia and the Americas led by the Pan African Climate
Justice Alliance (PACJA), Greenpeace International, Oxfam, WWF, and ActionAid.
Others include the International Trade Union Confederation, Friends of the
Earth Europe and 350.org.
Citing
frustration and disenchantment with the clear absence of commitment to
agreements by developed countries, the groups maintained that their decision to
walk out was the best in the circumstances as the Warsaw conference is already
primed to arrive at a fruitless pitch.
Delegates
carrying placards with messages such as “enough is enough,” “Polluters talk, we
walk,” and “we demand climate justice now” marched through the stadium before
assembling outside to make speeches.
Mithika
Mwenda of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) singled out Japan’s
goalpost-shifting tactics as well as the “brazenly cold disposition of USA,
Canada, Russia and Australia to immediate and deep emission cuts, changes to
the development pathways, climate finance and technology transfer, and global
emissions budget” as major pointers to the impending failure of the Warsaw
conference hence the inevitability of the walkout.
According
to Tasneem Essop of WWF, 800 civil society members have walked out believing
that “the best use of their time” was now to focus “on mobilizing people to
push our governments to take leadership for serious climate action.”
In
a similar vein, Kumi Naidoo of Greenpeace declared to the surging crowd “The
real hooligans are the CEO’s of fossil fuel companies.”
In
its statement of support, 350.org stated that “It’s powerful to see groups from
across civil society coming to the same conclusion that in order to keep open
any hope of an international climate treaty, we need to challenge the power of
the fossil fuel industry. By walking out of COP19, we’re walking into a fight
with the real enemies to progress: the coal, oil and gas companies that have a
stranglehold over our governments and economy. It’s time to stop sitting in
negotiating halls and stand with the Philippines and millions more who are
calling for real climate action in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan.”
The
well-coordinated walkout, which took the Polish national stadium venue of the conference
by storm was greeted with shock and disbelief by the conference secretariat and
the UNFCCC.
In
a swift reaction, Marcin Korolec, the sacked Polish Environment Minister who
still chairs the COP in a statement declared, "I regret the fact that some
NGOs decided to leave the COP19 climate conference to express their disapproval
towards the extending negotiations. The climate conference and non-governmental
organizations share common goals – all of us want to ensure effective climate
protection. Non-governmental observers have always mobilized negotiators to
greater efforts and ambitions.”
Korolec
ended his statement on a positive note, asking the CSOs to reconsider their
decision as “today in the morning after all-night negotiations, we have
achieved considerable progress on climate finance. The talks about the shape of
a new global agreement were also held throughout the night. I am convinced that
we are getting closer and closer to the final success. I hope that the voice of
NGOs will remain present in the discussion on how to solve the most important
problems of our planet."
The
2013 Climate conference in Warsaw has been bogged down by several issues
including the sack of the COP President in a Polish government reshuffle on
Wednesday, the controversial hosting of the World Coal Summit in Warsaw on Monday,
Japan’s declaration of its inability to abide by a previous pledge to emission
cuts and the historic action by the civil society organisations.
However,
The U.N.'s climate chief, Christiana Figueres, believes that the conference
would achieve its goals as "Everybody is working very hard; everybody is
working through the night; there is nobody here who is lazy."
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