O 120334Z DEC 08
FM AMEMBASSY CANBERRA
TO SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 0669
INFO AMEMBASSY BEIJING 
AMEMBASSY JAKARTA 
AMEMBASSY LONDON 
AMEMBASSY OTTAWA 
AMEMBASSY SEOUL 
AMEMBASSY TOKYO 
AMEMBASSY WELLINGTON 
AMCONSUL MELBOURNE 
AMCONSUL PERTH 
AMCONSUL SYDNEY 
DEPT OF ENERGY WASHINGTON DC
USEU BRUSSELS
THE WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON DC

C O N F I D E N T I A L CANBERRA 001265 
 
 
NOFORN 
 
STATE FOR OES/EGC TALLEY, EEB MONOSSON, G ROCHBERG 
WHITE HOUSE FOR CEQ SCHULTZ 
DOE FOR SKEER 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/13/2018 
TAGS: SENV KGHG PREL AS
SUBJECT: AUSTRALIA FEELING HEAT AT POZNAN 
 
REF: A. CANBERRA 1200 
     ¶B. CANBERRA 1154 
     ¶C. CANBERRA 1077 
     ¶D. CANBERRA 902 
 
 
Classified By: Economic Counselor Edgard Kagan, Reasons 1.4(b)(d) 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: A year after being widely praised for 
signing the Kyoto Protocol at the Bali Climate Change 
Conference, PM Kevin Rudd's government is now coming under 
fire to an unexpected degree for appearing to take a more 
conservative approach at the UN Framework Convention on 
Climate Change (UNFCCC) talks in Poznan. Both developed and 
developing countries have called on Australia to lead the 
negotiations by offering a target of at least 25 per cent, 
but the announcement of a more modest target on December 15 
will signal a far more pragmatic approach. End summary. 
 
Stalling on Climate Change Target? 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) UK Prime Minister Brown and former US vice-president 
Al Gore both called PM Rudd over the weekend to urge 
Australia to publicly back a 25 per cent target as the Rudd 
Government faces growing domestic pressure not to lead the 
world on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. This followed days 
of calls by developing countries, including Brazil, China, 
and others, on Australia to adopt a tough mid-term emissions 
reduction target.  European NGOs ranked Australia below 
almost all developed countries and even below Russia in terms 
of its climate-protection performance. On a table of the 57 
largest CO2 emitting nations, Australia was ranked sixth 
worst, ahead of only Kazakhstan, Luxembourg, the US, Canada 
and Saudi Arabia. The Climate Action Network said Australia 
was "trying to wriggle their way out of putting their 
(emissions reduction target) number on the table", and the 
Rudd Government was behaving like the Howard government. 
Leading climate change economist Nicholas Stern has also 
called on Australia to accept the advice of Australia 
National University economist and climate advisor Ross 
Garnaut and leave open the idea of a 25 per cent cut in 
greenhouse emissions by 2020. 
 
¶3. (C/NF) While Rudd and Climate Minister Penny Wong have 
expected some degree of negative press for their more 
conservative approach, the intervention of Brown, Gore, and 
Stern will likely have surprised them.  Green Party Senator 
Christine Milne, a vocal opponent of Rudd's softening on 
climate over the past year, told econoff December 11 that the 
calls by such high profile voices on climate change would not 
have been anticipated by government.  "I don't think they 
factored in (these calls)," Milne said.  "They expected to be 
able to muddy the waters at Poznan, achieve nothing, and then 
come home and blame the Brazils and South Africas for the 
breakdown, and the absence of the U.S. in a meaningful way 
(because of the U.S. presidential transition) to stick to 
what they've got." The additional pressure of calls by Brown, 
Gore and Stern will only feed expectations by supporters in 
Australia that the government take a harder line on climate 
change.  John Connor, CEO of the Climate Institute in Sydney, 
told us that the discontent with Australia was a result of 
Qtold us that the discontent with Australia was a result of 
"everyone looking for heroes in this discussion, and being 
disappointed to see one of the rising heroes falling out." 
 
¶4. (C/NF) The decision to delay announcement of Australia's 
proposed emissions reduction target until December 15 also 
caused more trouble than expected.  Connor said that climate 
activists, here and internationally, are "frustrated with the 
change of plan to announce our targets ahead of Poznan.  This 
has limited the negotiations.  People understand that this is 
a process but they are watching (the Rudd government) like 
hawks and wanted to keep the momentum going.  The expectation 
was that we would take to Poznan a target and put it on the 
table."  Milne agreed, saying that developing countries 
criticism of Australia was founded on a fear that Rudd and 
his team are negotiating in bad faith.  "Everyone from one 
end of the world to the other knows that Australia has bedded 
down what it is going to announce on Monday," she said. 
"Diplomatically, they've brought on themselves a lot of grief 
because they are seen as negotiating in bad faith."  China's 
aggressive calling out of Australia last week, when Pan 
Jiahua, a member of the PRC's Climate Experts Group, said 
publicly that Australia would be acting as if it considered 
itself a poor nation if it set less than a 25 percent 
reduction target, was "payback for bad diplomacy," Milne 
said.  South Africa also blasted Australia publicly at the 
Poznan talks.  "They've spent the last year pointing the 
finger at Beijing and saying their emissions are worse than 
Australia's, well Beijing is point the finger right back." 
Harinder Sidhu, Assistant Secretary for Strategy and Global 
Issues at the Department of Climate Change, said that the 
focus on Australia among developing countries at Poznan was 
indicative of a more reality-based discussion.  Sidhu said 
that this year's discussions involve a "growing number of 
developing countries coming into the negotiations looking at 
the real impacts emissions reductions will have on their 
economic growth, and they are acting in a much more realistic 
way when discussing them." 
 
Failure on CDM in Poznan Talks 
------------------------------ 
 
¶5. (SBU) In addition to international criticism, Australian 
climate negotiators suffered a major defeat this week when 
their draft proposal to extend the Clean Development 
Mechanism to clean coal and carbon-capture technology was 
held up by a coalition of developing nations led by Brazil, 
which refused to allow a draft proposal to be considered by 
Ministers in Poznan over the next two days.  This is 
interpreted by many as meaning there is no hope the idea will 
be adopted in a Copenhagen treaty next year, and is a blow to 
the Rudd government's plans to heavily support clean coal 
development internationally. 
 
Changing Signals 
---------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) In Poznan on December 11, Climate Change Minister 
Penny Wong was adamant the Government would stick to the 2010 
start-up date for carbon trading. "It would be wrong to 
introduce any uncertainty about the Government's intentions," 
she said. "One of the key considerations is to give business 
the certainty they need. We are talking, particularly in the 
energy sector, about long-run decisions that are going to be 
critical in Australia reducing its emissions over the next 10 
or 20 years." Wong said the Government is committed to 
leading the way at climate talks in Poland and is not 
stalling negotiations on climate change, despite refusing to 
reveal its greenhouse targets until after the UN conference." 
However, in Indonesia on December 9, Prime Minister Kevin 
Rudd took a different approach and insisted the Government 
had committed to an ambitious goal to reduce carbon emissions 
and that the reduction would be subject to the state of 
negotiations in the coming year.  He made the remarks as the 
Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, urged 
QIndonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, urged 
developed countries to lead the way and representatives of 
poor countries called for a reduction of 25 to 40 per cent. 
This reinforces the view that the government's Carbon 
Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) may leave open the 
possibility of cutting domestic emissions by 25 per cent by 
2020, but only as part of an ambitious and comprehensive 
international agreement including commitments from India and 
China.  Absent such a deal, the CPRS will likely lay out a 
target range of between 10 and 15 per cent reduction over 
2000 levels by 2020. 
 
Domestic Strife Over Emissions Trading 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶7.  (C/NF) In recent days, there has also been a definite 
increase in domestic criticisms of the Rudd government over 
climate change - with business and the Opposition calling for 
delay or a low target for the CPRS.  The Mining Council of 
Australia has criticized the proposed CPRS, claiming that its 
design is so onerous that even modest emissions targets would 
impose huge costs.  Even the Industry Australia group, 
previous supporters of the CPRS, has called for caution in 
its introduction because of the global economic crisis.  The 
Opposition supports emissions trading, but does not believe a 
scheme should be introduced until 2011 or 2012.   Milne said 
that while international criticism was worse than government 
expected, the reality was that domestic backlash was going to 
be even more troubling.  "There is a simmering concern with 
climate change in the minds of Australians, and come Monday 
there will be a breakout when they realize that the Rudd 
government isn't going to do anything more than (former PM) 
Howard was prepared to do.  Rudd is going to be surprised by 
how bad it will be.  The only thing that will save them is 
that the Opposition and Malcolm Turnbull are worse." 
 
¶8.  (SBU) Comment: Australian climate change negotiators, 
derided by one source we've talked to as "the same old team 
with the same old message," are swimming upstream against an 
unusual amount of criticism this year.  With the focus on the 
U.S.  muted because of the ongoing presidential transition, 
and the decision to not articulate its commitments in Poznan, 
Australia is under a much hotter spotlight than would have 
been the case if Rudd had backed up early indications that he 
would embrace a tough set of targets or stuck to announcing 
them in Poland.  End comment. 
 
McCallum