Ahead of the G8 summit in Japan where climate change is expected to figure prominently in the discussions, India made it amply clear that any international arrangement on climate change that had restrictive impact on India’s growth potential and sought to divide the world into blocs of haves and have-nots will not be acceptable.

Prime Minister’s special envoy on climate change Shyam Saran told The Indian Express that by insisting on emission-cut targets for countries like India, developed nations were showing complete disregard for the developmental concerns of these countries. This, he said, had dangerous implications and was aimed at permanently perpetuating the disparity in the living standards of people in the rich and poor countries.

“What they (the developed nations) are effectively saying is that they should get to keep what they have — their standard of living — because they attained it first, while at the same time trying to block the efforts of other countries to attain a similar lifestyle. Such NPT-kind of approach is not acceptable. It is definitely not going to work,” Saran said.

The NPT, or the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, bestows nuclear status on five countries, who also happen to be permanent members of the UN Security Council, while denying the option of developing nuclear weapons to the rest of the world.

Saran said the developed countries were also extremely reluctant to transfer technology or funds to the developing world to fight the adverse effects of climate change. This was giving rise to another technology denial regime, much like the nuclear apartheid which the NPT had created.

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