ENB:02:12
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PLENARY II
The Plenary reconvened at 7:30 pm Saturday night. The meeting was scheduled for 4:00 pm, however, due to continuing consultations on atmosphere and finance, it was delayed. During the 15-minute meeting, the Plenary quickly adopted two paragraphs in the finance text: 16(a)(i) on IDA and paragraph 15 on ODA (see texts above). The Plenary also succeeded in removing brackets and/or footnotes, related to the outcome of the discussions on finance, from a number of paragraphs in Chapters 11 (forests), 17 (oceans), 18 (freshwater), and 21 (solid wastes). Finally, the Chair, Celso Lafer, asked Amb. Bo Kjell‚n to report on progress made in resolving the bracketed phrase "safe and" in the atmosphere and technology transfer chapters. Kjell‚n requested more time as consultations were ongoing. Lafer then adjourned the Plenary until 9:15 pm.
The Plenary did not convene again until 10:20 pm. At that time, Kjell‚n reported that a generic solution to the problems related to "safe and" had been found. The agreed text should be a new paragraph in the Preamble of Agenda 21 and reads: "Throughout Agenda 21, the term `environmentally sound' means `environmentally safe and sound', in particular when applied to the terms `energy sources', `energy supplies', `energy systems' or `technology/technologies'." The result of this formulation is that all the brackets covering the notion of "safe and" would disappear and the text "safe and" would be deleted. A number of Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Morocco and Iran then expressed reservations about the resolution of Chapter 9 on Atmosphere. The text was approved at 10:45 pm. As this was the last issue to be resolved in Agenda 21, the text is now "bracket-free" and ready to be sent to the formal Plenary for adoption. Saudi Arabia, however, announced that it would like to place reservations on the entire text of Agenda 21.