New Delhi:A first formal draft of the UN climate summit deal in Egypt was published on Friday, yet again leaving out India's call for phase down of all fossil fuels and without any proposal on loss and damage funding. It reaffirmed that limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius requires rapid and deep emission cuts.
Loss and damage refer to the consequences of climate change that go beyond what people can adapt to, or when options exist but a community doesn't have the resources to access or utilise them. Financing or a new fund for addressing loss and damage -- for example money needed for relocating people displaced by floods -- has been a long-pending demand of poor and developing countries, including India.
But rich countries have avoided discussions on it for over a decade. Experts said it is surprising that the call for phasing down all fossil fuels didn't find a place in the draft text despite most developing countries and some developed nations, including the US, and the European Union supporting it.