22 November 2010: At a press conference on the upcoming Cancun Climate Change Conference, Robert C. Orr, Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Planning, stated that progress could be achieved on a number of issues, namely deforestation, technology transfer and stronger financing.

During the event at UN Headquarters in New York, US, Orr recognized that the expectations for the 16th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 16) to the UNFCCC are more limited than the high expectations that preceded the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in 2009. He said that agreement over fast-start funding would help build confidence in overall financing for the climate change agenda, and indicated that the UN Secretary-General would attend the opening of the Cancun conference and would urge countries to work towards a “balanced set of outcomes,” taking decisions where consensus exists and making progress on more challenging issues, such as mitigation, accountability and transparency, and the future of the Kyoto Protocol.

Warning against the costs of inaction, he stressed that States had a responsibility to ramp up their own actions on the ground – regardless of the negotiation. Orr also responded to questions about: ongoing denials by some groups of the existence of climate change; the impact of national politics on climate change negotiations; and UN security at the Cancun conference. Orr concluded by calling for a pragmatic approach to the Cancun Conference’s outcomes, urging negotiators to “make progress where we can, on the issues we can, and make sure that we don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good.” [Press Conference Transcript]