'Bali roadmap is victory for EU, world'

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates has said that the Bali roadmap adopted at the UN climate change conference is a victory for the EU and the whole world.

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates has said that the Bali roadmap adopted at the UN climate change conference is a victory for the European Union (EU) and the whole world.

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Socrates, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, said Sunday the conference was a victory for the world as well as for EU for fighting climate change, as the achievement has basically reached the goal set by the 27-member bloc.

The Portuguese prime minister said the EU attached great importance to the issue of climate change and had made huge efforts to promote a new global agreement on climate change.

The EU approves cutting emissions goals of global greenhouse gases by between 25 and 40 per cent by 2020 and to reduce them to well below half of 2000 levels by 2050, Socrates said.

He added that the EU had played an active role in adopting the Bali roadmap at the UN climate change.

The Bali Roadmap, agreed by over 180 countries meeting in Indonesia's resort island of Bali, contains a clear agenda for the key issues to be negotiated up to 2009. It includes action for adapting to the negative consequences of climate change, ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, ways to deploy climate-friendly technologies and financing both adaptation and mitigation measures.