ABSTRACT
In Chinese President Hu Jintao’s speech on climate change delivered to the United Nations General Assembly on September 22, 2009, he expressed the following view:
It is imperative to give full consideration to the development stage and basic needs of developing countries while we address climate change [. . .] Developed countries should take up their responsibility and provide new, additional, adequate, and predictable fi nancial support to developing countries to enable them to have access to climate-friendly technologies. 1
Many other developing countries 2 share this view, which clearly demonstrates that developing and least-developed nations tend to look at climate change as a North-South issue rather
* This chapter is part of the results of the Research Project on “ Current Trends of Chinese Law towards NonTrade Concerns such as Sustainable Development and the Protection of Environment, Public Health, Food Safety, Cultural, Social and Economic Rights, Labor Rights and the Reduction of Poverty from the Perspective of International Law and WTO Law ” coordinated by Professor Paolo Davide Farah at gLAWcal – Global Law Initiatives for Sustainable Development (United Kingdom) and at West Virginia University John D. Rockefeller IV School of Policy and Politics, Department of Public Administration, in partnership with the Center of Advanced Studies on Contemporary China (CASCC) in Turin (Italy), Maastricht University Faculty of Law, Department of International and European Law and IGIR – Institute for Globalisation and International Regulation (Netherlands), and Tsinghua University, School of Law, Institute of Public International Law and the Center for Research on Intellectual Property Law in Beijing (China). An early draft of this chapter was presented at the Conferences Series on “ China’s Infl uence on Non-Trade Concerns in International Economic Law ”, Second Conference held at Tsinghua University, School of Law on January 14-15, 2012. This publication and the Conference Series were sponsored by China-EU School of Law (CESL) at the China University of Political Science and Law (CUPL). The activities of CESL at CUPL are supported by the European Union and the People’s Republic of China.
