OREANDA-NEWS. December 14, 2012. From 26 November till 8 December 2012, the delegation of Ukraine took part in the 18th Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and 8th Meetings Parties to the Kyoto Protocol, which took place in Doha (Qatar). This was announced by Eduard Stavytskyi, Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine during a news briefing at the Government House on December 14th.

"Ukraine's stand was based on the national interests of the state, in view of main parameters of the second period of the Kyoto Protocol and the formation of a post-Kyoto "climate regime" within a new global agreement. The adopted decisions and amendments to the Kyoto Protocol show that Ukraine has managed to defend its position in a number of issues, including coherent state policy on climate change," said Eduard Stavytskyi.

In particular, he stressed Ukraine is a member of the second period of the Kyoto Protocol and commits itself to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% until 2020 against to emissions in 1990.

"Ukraine has the biggest commitments among all states of Kyoto Protocol of the second part," said Eduard Stavytskyi.

This is particularly significant, considering that Japan, Russia and New Zealand took commitments to limit emissions in the first period of the protocol, and took no such commitments in the second period. The commitments under the "Kyoto - 2" have been taken by the EU, Ukraine, Australia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Monaco.