Environmentalists are divided on the role the Association of South-East Asian Nations should play in tackling climate change, with some saying it should be a compelling voice in the debate and others saying not much can be expected of the alliance.
The statements follow the 16th Asean Summit in Hanoi last week, where leaders of the 10 countries in the regional grouping “reaffirmed their strong commitment to intensify efforts to address climate change and in this regard adopted the Asean Leaders’ Statement on Joint Response to Climate Change.”
The international environmental group Greenpeace criticized the Asean statement as “weak and compromising with its inclusion of a clause referring to the so-called Copenhagen Accord — the undesired outcome of December’s United Nations climate summit.”
The Copenhagen Accord has been criticized for being nonbinding to its signatories.
Zelda Soriano, the Asean political adviser for Greenpeace Southeast Asia, told the Jakarta Globe that Asean had the moral and legal obligation to be a leading voice in climate-change negotiations.
“On one hand, the Asean region is seriously suffering from a climate-change-induced drought — a testimony to its inherent geophysical vulnerability. Millions of Asean people are already affected, their health threatened and their production [and] income diminished,” Soriano said. “Asean is morally bound to address the climate-change dangers by decisive regional action and by pushing for a global response.”
She said that under the 2007 Asean Charter, the group was under a legal obligation to transcend its tradition of open consensus, enhance consultation on matters that seriously affect the interests of the region and translate regional agreements into domestic policies or action.
But WWF Indonesia said Asean could not be expected to be a strong voice on the climate change issue.
“Asean is not seen as a negotiating bloc like the European Union at climate-change negotiations, so don’t get your hopes too high for transforming the community to become a stronger voice,” said Fitrian Ardiansyah, WWF Indonesia’s program director for climate and energy.
“We need to keep in mind that this community is based on moral obligations rather than political obligations like the EU,” Fitrian said. “That’s why it doesn’t really have any binding agreement or statement.”
However, Fitrian said the Asean statement was significant for its member countries because the related ministries would have to turn it into more specific actions.
