Jon,

Thanks for the reply. I came across the article you link to shortly after finishing this piece. I must say, however, that having read it, I wouldn't change my position.

China is to blame, it's plain to see. But it is by no means as singularly culpable as the post-COP15 spin operation (in particular the British one) has made it out to be.

The author of that article makes the valid points, as do you, that China insisted on removing a limit on temperature rises and any legally binding elements. However, he also regurgitates what he calls Obama's offers of "serious cuts" of 17% of emissions on 2005 levels, or 3% using everyone else's measure. Put simply, this is not nearly enough to achieve anything like the 1.5 degree limit we need. With levels of commitment like this from such an important emitter, targets were never going to be reached even if the Chinese had allowed them to appear in the conference text. Moreover, if the US was "obviously prepared to up its offer," then why did Obama arrive making veiled threats to China, leave levelling overt criticisms at China, and apparently not budge an inch on his original position?

I agree with you about the ALBA; its members are at times prone to blindly attacking US initiatives simply on the grounds that they originated from Washington. But on this occasion, they are justified in pointing out the role of the US in the weakness of this deal. They may not have achieved much aside from preventing a formal approval of the accord, but really that's the point; they don't have the wherewithal. Unless the G77 as a bloc can come round to the idea that the only chance for real progress is if they hold out together against deals like this, then the point Chávez et al were making will indeed end up as just more noise. But this time, we should lsiten to the noise.

Ultimately, the problem of China is huge. The purpose of this article was to argue that the problem of the United States is pretty considerable too, a fact which has been obscured by spin, and which the ALBA has been wrongly attacked simply for pointing out.