Cochabamba Conference proposes climate justice tribunal to tackle climate change

The conference on climate change organised by the Bolivian government has put forward some novel proposals to pressurise Western leaders to speed up climate negotiations.

Franz Chavez

A WORLD people's referendum on climate change will be held in April 2011 for the earth's peoples to decide how to address this global problem.

Although it is hoped that some states will cooperate, the participation of governments will not be essential to the referendum, as civil society organisations are to plan it according to their own lights and the traditions and customs of each local area.

This was one of the final resolutions at the close of the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, held in the central Bolivian city of Cochabamba.

The definitive wording of the text may be modified, but the questions proposed for the referendum are:

a. Do you agree with re-establishing harmony with nature and recognising the rights of Mother Earth?

b. Do you agree with changing the model of over-consumption and waste which characterises the capitalist system?

c. Do you agree that developed countries should reduce and reabsorb their domestic greenhouse gas emissions so that average global temperature does not rise by more than one degree Celsius?

d. Do you agree to shifting all expenditure away from wars and increasing the budget for the defence of Mother Earth?

e. Do you agree with a Climate Justice Tribunal to bring to account those who destroy Mother Earth?

The 19-22 April conference adopted a radical agenda intended to influence the official negotiations on climate change carried out under the aegis of the United Nations.

The planet's average temperature must not be allowed to rise by more than one degree Celsius this century, and therefore industrialised nations must cut their greenhouse gas emissions, which cause global warming, by over 50% by 2020 compared with 1990 emissions, the resolutions affirm.

Industrialised countries - regarded as responsible because of their leading role in industrial development, which has caused climate change - are called on to pay the debt they owe for polluting the world's atmosphere, on pain of legal action if they fail to honour this obligation.

Among other proposals are the creation of a multilateral organisation to manage environmental issues, international recognition of the rights of Mother Earth, a ban on privatising knowledge, protection for climate migrants and the fullest respect for the rights and freedoms of indigenous peoples.

About 35,000 people attended the conference at Cochabamba at the invitation of Bolivian President Evo Morales, in an attempt to strengthen the voice of global civil society at the forthcoming 16th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP16), to be held in November in Cancun, Mexico.

'May the next meeting in Mexico not be in vain; may decisions be taken for the benefit of all people,' Morales said at the summit, which closed with a mass rally attended by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

The Venezuelan president proposed that the member governments of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA) should be the vehicle to convey the Cochabamba resolutions to COP16 in Cancun.

According to Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca, the 35,000 participants included 9,254 foreign visitors from 142 countries, and official delegations from 47 states.

Some 5,000 intellectuals and activists participated via online sessions that culminated in the presentation of proposals by 17 working groups on as many topics.

The traditional form of debate at official summits was subverted in Cochabamba, where the focus was on analysing the causes of the climate crisis. And Morales, completing the vision, blamed capitalism for the debacle.

The model of capitalist society is in crisis, and the alternatives are in the hands of the peoples, he said in his speech.

A sunny afternoon in the Cochabamba 'Felix Capriles' football stadium was the setting for the closing celebration and final speeches.

This 22 April, designated Mother Earth Day by the UN, also saw the formation of a movement calling on the United Nations to adopt a universal declaration on the rights of nature.

The Cochabamba resolutions rejected the classic pattern of placing conditions on financial aid to developing countries.

The world is experiencing a 'great crisis' in which 75% of greenhouse gases are emitted by 25% of its countries, the industrialised states, causing direct impacts such as droughts and floods.

The Cochabamba conference also rejected carbon compensation schemes, which are mechanisms to compensate the polluting emissions in rich countries by means of projects that curb emissions in the developing world, as well as carbon trading and other profit-based financial mechanisms, saying these were irrelevant to the problem's real solution.

The damage to nature is likely to be irreversible if the earth's temperature continues to rise, and tens of thousands of people may have to migrate when the glaciers melt and deserts expand, the final declaration said.

The document demands the elimination of all new forms of colonialism, and the adherence of rich countries to a new phase of commitments to real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions within the framework of the Kyoto Protocol.

Participants at Cochabamba expressed their rejection of forest conservation programmes to compensate for carbon dioxide emissions, and denounced attempts to expel peasant farmers and indigenous people from land rich in natural resources and water.

'We condemn REDD (the United Nations Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries)' for violating the rights of peoples and the sovereignty of states, and undermining the customs and traditions of original peoples, the final document says.

The conference called for the creation of a climate justice tribunal with  powers  to  prosecute  persons or companies responsible for pollution,  and  for  a  thorough  reform  of the UN to allow countries that fail to live up to their greenhouse gas reduction commitments to be put on trial. - IPS 

*Third World Resurgence No. 236, April 2010, pp 19-20