12.31pm:
More despair at Obama’s speech.
ActionAid’s climate expert, Raman Mehta, said:
Obama has said nothing to save the Copenhagen conference from failure.
The US is the one major player yet to move. Developing countries have come here to negotiate in good faith but feel they have been cheated and it looks like they will leave empty handed.
Greenpeace US’s executive director Phil Radford said:
The world was waiting for the spirit of yes we can, but all we got was my way or the highway.
He [Obama] crossed an ocean to tell the world he has nothing new to offer, then he said take it or leave it. By offering no movement on US global warming pollution cuts he showed his disregard for the science and the victims of climate change in the United States and abroad. He now risks being branded as the man who killed Copenhagen.
He said all parties must move, but he offered no movement. He said the decades long split between the rich world and poor needs to end, but his vision of a deal here would give us a 3C temperature rise and devastate Africa and the small island states.
12.21pm:
Friends of the Earth is “deeply disappointed” by Obama’s speech.
Andy Atkins, its executive director,
The President is right that the endeavours in Copenhagen will go down in history – but unless we see a massive shift in the US position, it will be for all the wrong reasons.
If the President’s idea of action is to cut US emissions by 4% on 1990 levels then we’re heading for climate catastrophe. Barack Obama should have taken the opportunity to up his proposed cuts to at least 40% by 2020 and ditch carbon offsetting.
Obama has deeply disappointed not just those listening to his speech at the UN talks – he has disappointed the whole world.
12.20pm:
A British official at the talks said the prospects of securing agreement were “not great” but Gordon Brown was committed to staying until “the very last minute” to secure a deal, according to PA.
12.06pm:
You can now see that leaked UN analysis for yourself here. The three page document says countries ‘ought’ to limit global warming to 2C, but does not bind them to do so.