Special Press Briefing
Speaker: Ambassador Koji Tsuruoka
Title: Director-General for Global Issues, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan

Date: 7 June 2007
Place: International Media Center, Heiligendamm G8 Summit, Germany


Moderator: Director General for Global issues of the Japanese Foreign Ministry, and he will be explaining to you regarding the outcome of the climate change discussion that took place today.

Mr. Koji Tsuruoka, Director-General for Global Issues, Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Thank you very much for coming. I am sorry I am a little late, the train took a little time to arrive. I am here today to brief you on two points. One, the discussion that Prime Minister Abe made as it led into the agreement that was announced by Chancellor Merkel after lunch, and second, the Prime Minister's evaluation of the results of this discussion.

First of all, as you may know, the morning session of the G8 leaders had two parts, the latter part being the discussion on the issue of climate change. The various leaders of course mentioned and spoke about their positions, and I would just like to share with you what the Japanese Prime Minister stated during this discussion.

Towards the end of the discussion, he took the floor and stated his own view based on the policy that he proposed, called "Cool Earth 50." First of all, he stated that the unity and consensus of the G8 is indispensable and important so that the G8 can send out a strong message to the rest of the world, which is an act that will be commensurate with the responsibility of the global economic leaders with large greenhouse gas emissions. He then stated that it is important to include all the major emitters in our efforts of combating global warming, and that he had formulated his proposal of reduction by 50 percent by the year 2050 in order to allow all the major emitters to come on board and join in this effort. He was also referring to the importance of addressing this issue together with the developing countries, and that has been a very important outcome that he wants to see coming out of this Summit.

There were of course other leaders who spoke, and on that basis the sherpas were instructed to work on the language, and then that language after being worked out by the sherpas had been brought to the leaders themselves, who were having a working lunch, and that is where the confirmation of agreement on the language was achieved. And of course you already know the announcement by Chancellor Merkel after that.

Now let me turn to the second point, which is the evaluation by the Prime Minister of the result of this discussion. First of all, he was very happy that the G8 leaders were united in producing this document, which will be a very solid basis for working further, as he will be leading the G8 Summit next year in Japan, Toyako, Hokkaido. There is no doubt that climate change will continue to be, if not the most, one of the most important issues that the leaders will be addressing next year in Japan at the G8 Summit. He was also happy to note that the points that he made with various leaders in the G8 context, as well as bilaterally with Chancellor Merkel, President Bush, and others, had been included in the agreed document, namely reference to the decision by Japan, which refers to "Cool Earth 50," and also to the reference of reduction by at least 50 percent by the year 2050, which will be considered seriously by the leaders. He believes it has been a good outcome, taking into account the Japanese position and thereby laying the ground for further work. He also said that of course there is a lot of work ahead of us, including, first of all, the engagement of the large emitting countries, such as China and India. He said also that he has spoken to both the Chinese and the Indian leaders beforehand, explaining his own proposal, and that these diplomatic efforts will continue on. He also stated that the effort that he will be undertaking will start together with the Japanese people in a national campaign that is aimed at achieving the target that Japan has committed to fulfilling under the Kyoto Protocol.

That is what has happened over the past two or two and a half hours. I would be happy to take questions. Thank you.

Q: Was Kosovo a subject of this meeting, the second session?

Mr. Tsuruoka: The afternoon session, I understand, discussed Kosovo, but I am afraid I was addressing some other issues during that session.

Q: Ambassador, thank you very much for the briefing, it is a really good opportunity to meet with governments during the G8. The mutual consensus and the importance of that on what Prime Minister Abe did and the 50 percent target agreed by 2050 by a number of the countries, but clearly excluding the US. What would be your expectation of the Plus Five countries tomorrow in respect to that, because, as you say, it is very important that those countries become engaged in this, but clearly they are going to point at the omission of the US from that particular paragraph and question how they can move without the US being there.

Secondly, the Gleneagles dialogue was mentioned specifically in Paragraph 47, which is very encouraging, but that process does not include the largest emitting countries. How does Japan see the Gleneagles dialogue moving through this year's process, the September Ministerial, and the ministerial you have planned in March?

And finally, if you would allow me, for your Summit next year, what role will biodiversity play? We already had an agenda set out, but I am just wondering, for example, we had a biodiversity COP happening in May next year here in Germany. How will that play into your agenda for the Summit next year? Thank you very much.

Mr. Tsuruoka: Thank you. Chatham House is always renowned as being very precise and specific about questions of major importance, and I welcome your question. The first question, how the other five who are invited for the dialogue tomorrow will respond--I will have to ask them, because I cannot speak on their behalf, but I can share with you that Prime Minister Abe has been in contact with both China and India in elaborating his own thoughts about addressing climate change before he came to Heiligendamm. This was a contact at the highest level, because he himself initiated the contact with the leaders of both China and India.

On the Chinese side, the Chinese Premier was in Japan about a month ago, and as a result of the discussion with the Prime Minister the agreement came out for China to agree on seriously engaging in the framework of post-Kyoto. This is a welcoming commitment that we believe was the first official statement on the record printed as a joint announcement between the Japanese and the Chinese governments in the presence of the two leaders. We have been in touch with the Chinese Government from that time on, explaining more in detail "Cool Earth 50," which is a proposal of the Prime Minister, and contact is being kept regularly with them. We have yet to hear what the Chinese head of state will have to say tomorrow, but we have heard his briefing on major policy issues that is addressing energy savings as well as climate change. We see this as a positive element because it shows the seriousness under which they are trying to address this issue. Especially it is welcome because these announcements were made before they come to attend the discussion tomorrow. We now have a number of detailed views from the Chinese Government which are fairly comprehensive. I have yet to finish reading all the announcements that they made, but this is indeed a positive move, and we hope that we will be having a very constructive dialogue with them tomorrow.

On the part of bilateral contact with India, after the Prime Minister spoke to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, we have been in touch with them bilaterally at the officials' level, and the Indian Government is fully aware of Prime Minister Abe's proposal "Cool Earth 50." Of course, this is common to both China and India that they emphasize the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. We have no intention of denying that, but we also are emphasizing the need to be responsible on the part of major or large emitting countries, because the effort on the part of industrialized countries alone will not be sufficient in addressing this global issue of global warming.

I am not familiar with the other three countries yet, because we are expanding bilateral contacts and we will therefore welcome having dialogue with them tomorrow.

The G20 Gleneagles dialogue. This is a dialogue that we ourselves have been actively promoting, because if you remember, when Prime Minister Blair proposed this dialogue at Gleneagles, the Japanese Prime Minister, then Mr. Koizumi, volunteered to receive the outcome of these dialogues at Japan's Presidency. As you correctly pointed out, there will be one meeting in the fall, chaired by Germany, the current president of the G8; there will be another one in the spring next year in Japan, as we will take over the presidency of the G8. We are seeing progress on the various dialogues that are being conducted, including the more in-depth discussion on energy saving efforts and sharing of technology as well. These are also important means for promoting the fight against climate change, and we are hopeful that we will be receiving very constructive reports from the G20 dialogue.

Biodiversity is of course an important subject that we ourselves have been maintaining a very keen interest in. You may know that COP10 of the biodiversity convention, it is our hope that it will be held in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, which was the site of the Expo which focused on the environment and climate change. This is an issue that is not separate from the overall agenda of climate change. Of course, biodiversity is a source for enriching or continuing to enrich the lives of human beings, and we would like to make a contribution as we go on addressing this issue.

My colleague reminds me that you also pointed out the result of the discussion of the leaders, being that the US may not be included in the reduction by half by 2050. Of course I cannot speak on behalf of the United States, but as I have said earlier, and using the Prime Minister's words, he puts top priority on including all the major emitting countries in our effort for the future framework of addressing climate change. We see the American engagement in this Summit as a very positive and constructive action on the part of the United States. If you look back at how they have acted on this issue, even at Gleneagles, where Prime Minister Blair was very adamant in promoting this process, we were still behind in producing this engagement by the United States. We ourselves, on the part of the Japanese Government, have been in contact bilaterally with the US Government and relevant officials. You will recall that upon the Prime Minister's visit about a month ago to Washington, the Prime Minister was able to formulate a joint announcement with President Bush addressing energy security and climate change, and this was the first document that President Bush had his name included on in which the statement was confirmed that the US also agrees to work on the stabilization of greenhouse gas concentration. We saw that as a sign of the change that the US was going to make, and we have been in touch with them throughout, leading to the Summit here at Heiligendamm.

The wording that you see in the final text is also supported by the United States, although it has reference to the reduction by half by 2050, although, as you have correctly pointed out, that wording does not necessarily mean that the United States is committed to do that, and we all understand that. But we have been able to confirm that we will be working very seriously in order to achieve a common view on the long-term objective, and that in itself we see as a very positive step forward, and we would like to work on this and capitalize on what we have been able to do at Heiligendamm. It is especially important for Japan because we will be hosting the G8 Summit next time.

Q: I am a bit surprised that you say that the wording does not necessarily mean that the US is included, although the US has signed on to this vehicle; the wording says "we."

Mr. Tsuruoka: I will refer that to the person from Chatham House, because that is the wording in English. Of course the United States has supported and agreed to the language that you see, but here the question was not whether the United States agreed on the language; the question was whether the United States committed itself to the reduction by half by 2050. That was the question and that was my answer.

Moderator: Any other questions?

Q: We have followed the developing of the text draft since February, I think, and at a quite late point, thanks to our information, under the influence or advocacy of the Japanese Government, concerning the 50 percent target by 2050 the base year has disappeared from the text. Before that there was a reference given to 1990; at the final version, one cannot find the 1990. Could you explain this, please?

Mr. Tsuruoka: The reference to 1990 is what has been decided by the European Union as its own policy. If you read the Japanese proposal, it does not refer to 1990. We referred more in general, referencing it to the "current level." We have intentionally avoided singling out any particular year as a base year, because if we are talking about 2050, we believe that there is not enough scientific evidence that allows us to be specifically promising what we will be doing by 2050.

At the same time, it is important that we identify the long-term goal so that we can work backwards from that goal in identifying what we should be doing during the time that leads up to the year 2050. The reduction by half is indeed in itself a formidable target. It does not have to be defined in any specific way in terms of CO2 or in terms of temperature because there is disagreement as to the level that needs to be accomplished by that time. If we need to agree on that figure, and if that becomes an obstacle to engaging the major emitters in a discussion, it is our choice not to dwell ourselves in arriving at an agreement on those figures, but rather start discussion on a wider basis, with full engagement of the larger emitters. It is not our intention to continue to limit the participation to this global effort of all the major emitters.

The Prime Minister has stated in his policy speech that we should move beyond Kyoto. "Beyond Kyoto" has two meanings. One is the coverage, and two is the depth of the commitment, which, combined, will reach us to achieve the goal of the long-term reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, and that is the intention that we have made in formulating that proposal. Had we been more specific, we might have been spending time debating base year or numbers. We do not think that is necessarily a very constructive approach at this time. We are not discarding the possibility of being more specific as we go on, but we believe that it is important to have a very solid first step that will include all the major emitters. The Prime Minister today stated the next challenge for us is to include the larger emitters of the developing world. So far at least, by the inclusion of the United States in this document, I think we are confirming that the United States is now on board in engaging in serious discussion about global warming. I do not know how we will come out tomorrow when we have dialogue with the other five countries, and we are indeed expecting and anticipating that they will have a positive response to what the G8 has been able to agree today.

Q: My question is in regards to and possibly with reference to that one as well. My question is that you would like to engage other large emitters such as China and India leading up to the Bali conference and even next year's Summit. My question is, what is the possibility of reaching a concrete agreement and possibly concrete targets before or leading up to the Summit in Japan next year?

Mr. Tsuruoka: We would all like to know that. I am afraid I am not a prophet and cannot really tell what will happen in the future except to say that we are very, very serious about this. We will try our best, and the Prime Minister himself is putting his political capital in line, and he has led the Japanese effort in addressing climate change. As I said earlier, he has already spoken to both the Chinese and the Indian leaders, and he will continue to do so. We cannot impose or force any other country, because they are sovereign states, and we need to respect them, but we have to consult them so that we have an agreement in promoting our common goal. Japan is not doing this for Japan's sake. Of course, Japan will benefit if global warming is stopped, naturally; any country would. But I think it is very important for us to work on this issue, because we believe that this is a global interest, and that is why we are not ashamed to ask other countries to join in our efforts. Of course, the larger emitters are going to be the first ones that we will insist they participate. We need to be flexible and also allow diversity, because circumstances differ from one country to another. If we do not have the flexibility of being able to address their own interests, which may be legitimate interests that have, then we will alienate them. Alienation is not going to produce a global partnership that we need in addressing this issue, and therefore we will continue very hard our diplomatic efforts in addressing this.

You will see a number of conferences that are lined up. One you mentioned, Bali, a very important meeting. But we also have an Asia-Pacific the APEC conference coming up this fall. We have no doubt that this issue will also be center staged in the APEC conference, which will be led by Australia and held in Sydney. There are other fora in which Japan participates regularly, like the East Asia Summit, where we have dialogue with ASEAN countries and our northeast Asian partners, and there again we have larger emitters and very important countries that have a strong voice in the international community. We would like to engage them in discussing this issue of climate change. The agreement and consensus that we have now at the G8 Summit at Heiligendamm provides us with a very solid base of continuing to do this in different fora. This is not the end of the story; this will be a continuing effort, and we will try our best to engage other countries. Thank you.

Q: Thank you very much, Ambassador. My question is, do you think that the G8 Summit should develop into a G10 or perhaps a G13 in the near future, like, let us say, for next year?

Mr. Tsuruoka: That is sort of a political question that I have really no mandate to address, although it may be, again, a very interesting question. You may remember that it was in Okinawa, which was a G8 Summit hosted by Japan, by then-Prime Minister Mori that started the dialogue which we call outreach. At that time we thought that since Japan is the only country taking part in the G8 from Asia, we wanted to give a chance for the other Asian countries to have a dialogue with the G8 leaders, and we invited a number of Asian countries. At the same time, because developing countries are so important, we invited some African countries to come to that outreach program. That is not necessarily a G-something, it was G8 in dialogue with visitors, guests, and those whose voices we wanted to hear. The G8 system is rotating presidency. This year we are under the German presidency, and Germany decided to invite the five countries with which we will have dialogue tomorrow. We do not know what will be the dialogue that we will be conducting next year, because it all depends on the agenda and issues that we need to take up. I do not know whether there is any intention on any part of the G8 countries to turn this into a G9 or G10, so I really cannot answer that part of your question.

Q: Can I say this started as the G7, and then Russian stepped in, so I think that if you consider that countries like India and China have such a lot to say in this climate change and emissions, then it would be feasible to introduce them as members of the group. If you did it for Russia, why not for China and India? I mean, we are talking about more than two billion people there.

Mr. Tsuruoka: Well, first of all, I think you should ask them if they want to join, and again, I cannot speak on their behalf. We have not had that kind of discussion among the G8 leaders, and so I really do not know the answer to your question.

Q: I was just wondering if there was any discussion during the Summit about the need for greater flexibility on currencies from China?

Mr. Tsuruoka: So far, I am not aware of that, but I have not followed each and every discussion, because my main responsibility is climate change, so I cannot give you an authoritative answer to that question. Sorry.

Q: One more question regarding the chairman's address. It appears that it needs to be said that the regular agreement will not be reached, setting out some roadmap which provide chairman's headings in which you fail to agree on this declaration, so there is no possibility to have the chairman's text now.

Mr. Tsuruoka: I do not know where you obtained that information. We have always been working on the basis of the G8 agreed text, because that is G8 tradition-therefore I am not expecting any additional document to be released by the chairman at this time.

Related Information (G8 Summit 2007 Heiligendamm)
Related Information (Cool Earth 50)


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