WELCOME BY MR LLUĺS MARIA DE PUIG,

PRESIDENT OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY

TO DR RAJENDRA PACHAURI, CHAIRMAN OF IPCC (UN)

INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE

(Strasbourg, Tuesday 29 September 2009, at about 3.30pm)

I am now pleased to welcome Dr Rajendra PACHAURI, Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to our Parliamentary Assembly for the enlarged debate on challenges posed by climate change.

Let me say that IPCC has been established by World Meteorological Organization and United Nations Environment Programme in 1988, prior to the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and the adoption of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol.

Thousands of scientists from all over the world contribute to the work of the IPCC on a voluntary basis. Today the IPCC represents the leading scientific and technical body which provides the world with a clear scientific view on the current state of climate change and its potential environmental and socio-economic consequences. It has an important role to set benchmarks for our political action.

Dr PACHAURI, you have heard the introduction made by the Rapporteur John Prescott who underlined the political challenges we are facing in the coming months in order to achieve an ambitious, binding - and above all - fair global agreement in Copenhagen.

Dr Pachauri we are eager to hear your views.

You have the floor.