As the United Nations climate change talks in Durban, famously called COP 17, approach, Newsclick speaks with Meena Raman, Third World Network, Malaysia, on where the world stands today and what to expect from Durban summit.

Failure of climate change summit in Copenhagen has been disappointing. But instead of playing blame games lessons have to be learnt for resumption of talks. In an exclusive interview with Newsclick, Martin Khor talks about mistakes occurred and way forward to take these negotiations to a positive conclusion.

Former Special Advisor to the UNFCC secretariat, Mukul Sanwal on the state of the climate change negotiations after Copenhagen.

Nation’s leading climate scientist, James Hansen, who wasn’t at the Copenhagen climate summit explains why he thinks it’s ultimately better for the planet that the talks collapsed.Also Dr. Hansen tells about his new book, Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth about the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity, and much more.

Too many leaders had gathered in Copenhagen to have it end in a complete failure. Though the accord was a face saving device for them, it does retain global warming and climate change as an agenda for all of us in the future. A complete failure might have killed all hope of a future binding agreement. Whether the political statement is only platitudes or will it in future provide any teeth in it to bite, if converted into a legal document, is the big question.
 

 With the talks entering the final 24 hours on a knife-edge, the emergence of the document seriously undermines the statements by governments that they are aiming to limit emissions to a level ensuring no more than a 2C temperature rise over the next century, and indicates that the last day of negotiations will be extremely challenging.