December 13, 2011

Delegates to the U.N. conference on climate change held in Durban, South Africa have finally reached an agreement to extend the Kyoto Protocol on reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and to adopt a new international accord by 2015. Japan, however, announced its disagreement with the extension, arousing worldwide criticism.

The Kyoto Protocol requires industrialized nations to make efforts to reduce CO2 emissions by an average 5.2% from the 1990 level during a set 5-year period between 2008 and 2012. In the 17th Conference of the Parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP17), state parties agreed to set another period calling for international commitment to the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions after the current period ending in 2012. 39 nations and regions, including European Union nations, announced their commitment during the new period.

However, while giving no views on the new international pact with legal force applying to all state parties, the Japanese government declared that it will discontinue its commitment under the Kyoto Protocol.

Explaining its stance, Environment Minister Hosono Goshi said that nations bound by the Kyoto pact emit greenhouse gasses which account for only a quarter of the total amount of global emissions and thus the pact is useless for the future framework in which “all nations would be obliged to cut CO2 emissions.”

The Japanese government is reluctant to conclude any international pact if such a pact does not require all states releasing greenhouse gasses to reduce emissions. The government also aims to defang the Kyoto Protocol by abandoning it and making the excuse that only a few nations are joining in the accord.

The Japanese government is loyal to the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren) which supports Japan’s withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and calls for the reduction of CO2 emissions to be left to each nation’s voluntary efforts.

Nippon Keidanren urges the government to abandon its target to cut CO2 emissions by 25% from the 1990 level that former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio vowed to the world because such a target is an obstacle to its growth strategy, which includes the export of nuclear power plant technology.

Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Representatives Kasai Akira, who is in charge of the JCP task force regarding global warming, commented on the COP17 as follows:

The outcome of the conference agreeing to extend the commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and creating a new international pact by 2015 is a step forward. However, the Japanese government hindered negotiations for continuation of international efforts to tackle climate change as called for by the Kyoto Protocol. Japan should stop moving in the opposite direction of world opinion. We will urge the government to firmly maintain its 25% reduction target as the mid-term goal.