'Consummate diplomats' work at untangling climate treaty

I

Christiana Figueres, executive secretary
 of the United Nations Framework
 Convention on Climate Change,
the main international body
 for addressing climate change.

f diplomacy is the art of keeping one's options open, then the negotiators of a new Paris climate change treaty must be consummate diplomats.

And if using brackets in a draft text is the equivalent of a diplomatic emoticon—one that signals [uncertainty] [dispute] [intransigence]— then the talks must have gone into a peculiar form of emoji overdrive.

Put forth by the co-chairs of the Paris process on Friday, a new 83-page treaty draft remains a tangle of bewildering brackets sandwiched among opaque options highlighting areas of disagreement.

Even so—as a summer of grinding negotiations turns toward a frenzied autumn of brinksmanship—the main principles that a treaty needs to convey are becoming clearer.

Read the Inside Climate News story - “New Climate Treaty Draft Still a Tangled Mess, but Growing Clearer.”