As COP-10 in Buenos Aires draws to a close with a ministerial meeting from 15-17 December, environmental activists are pressuring developing countries such as India, Brazil and China to agree to emissions controls - whether under Kyoto, or some other mechanism altogether. On Monday, the Union of Concerned Scientists went as far as saying that "If India, China and Brazil replicate our pattern of fossil-intensive development, the game is over" (see news story)

The Sustainable Development Network issued a press release today to suggest that "Imposing Kyoto-style emissions restrictions on poor countries would be 'immoral".

Inevitably there will be a battle in the final days of COP-10 over the issue -- with offers of carrots in the form of foreign aid and technology transfers to entice bureaucrats from poor countries to sign up. Not only will Kyoto-style emissions controls do nothing to help poor countries to deal with the potential problems of climate change, it will slow development and thereby perpetuate disease, misery and suffering that already exist today.

For COP10, the SDN released a blueprint for thinking about sustainable development and climate change, to encourage some coherent thinking on the subject.