Another large industrializing country moved yesterday to reinstate "common but differentiated responsibilities" into the future of U.N. climate negotiations, assigning wealthy industrialized nations continued responsibility for making absolute cuts while hinting that large developing nations would stick to intensity targets.

In a call with reporters ahead of the next round of U.N. climate talks that are set to begin in Doha, Qatar, later this month, Brazilian Undersecretary Luiz Alberto Figueiredo said major developing emitters are already doing their part to combat climate change by cutting the rate at which their emissions increase.

"We are doing our job, we are doing what is expected of us, and we would hope others would do the same," he said. The 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recommended that major developing emitters reduce the growth of their emissions, he noted.

"It is exactly the recommendation of science what we are doing," he said. "I cannot say the same for developed countries."

Asked whether he expected Brazil and other high-emitting industrializing nations to accept absolute cuts under a future agreement to be completed by 2015 to take effect by 2020, Figueiredo was evasive.

"We will definitely follow the recommendations of science," he said.

The platform adopted at the close of last year's Conference of the Parties in Durban, South Africa, does not state that different emitters will bear different responsibilities. The U.S. interpretation of the Durban Platform is that it calls for all major emitters by 2020 to be held to the same legal obligations for the first time in history.

But that is not an interpretation that major emitters have accepted. They have instead stated repeatedly throughout the year that they will accept emissions cuts only on their terms but expect industrialized nations to bear more responsibility for reductions.

Figueiredo said on the call that industrialized nations have fallen short. They should be reducing their emissions 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, he said, but none is.

'A question of making progress'

The European Union agreed last year in Durban to a second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol, despite defections from other nations that participated in the first commitment period that ends this year. But the bloc has not yet increased its commitment to slash emissions by 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 to 30 percent, although it is now considering such a move.

The United States, meanwhile, is not a party to the Kyoto Protocol, but the administration has said it is on track to curb emissions by 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. The Treasury Department's environmental tax division chief, Gilbert Metcalf, was the latest official to affirm this Tuesday, noting that the United States has already cut its emissions 11 percent below 2005 levels, due to a combination of economic recession and efficiency policies.

Figueiredo said the level of ambition shown by rich nations was inadequate but better than nothing.

"We see that if it is politically not possible for them to follow the advice of science, it is nevertheless important that countries are doing their best under the circumstances," he said.

Asked whether he was happy with countries' level of ambition, he said: "It is not a question of happiness. It is a question of making progress. It's certainly a question of going forward."

He called the European Union's commitment to stick with Kyoto through a second commitment period "laudable," saying all future agreements depend on a second period.

"It is extremely unlikely that we can achieve anything else unless a second commitment period in Doha is firmly in place," Figueiredo said. Parties will complete work on it at Doha.

But he brushed aside a question about European Union officials' request for a minister-level discussion about the gap between pledged and actual emissions reductions, pointing to the European Union's decision not to ratchet up its commitment to 30 percent.

"If they are not ready to do so, it is very strange that they want to engage in a discussion about something that they are not ready to do," he said.