Costa Rican diplomat Christiana Figueres Olsen said Monday that she was dropping her bid to succeed Ban Ki-moon as the United Nations Secretary-General due to the lack of support at the U.N. Security Council.
"The Paris agreement could be an exception or could become the norm for multilateral cooperation in the 21st century," Figueres told reporters Thursday.
Costa Rican Christiana Figueres was awarded the Medal of Paris on Wednesday for helping broker the historic, 195-nation deal to avert climate change that was sealed in the French capital last week.
Costa Rica plans to sign the "Under 2 MOU" carbon emissions reduction pledge, committing the country to emit less than 2 metric tons of greenhouse gases per capita annually by 2050, regardless of whether the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Paris yields an agreement.
Costa Rica committed to a goal of zero net emissions by 2085 in its proposal for the Paris climate talks — 64 years later than the 2021 carbon neutrality goal set by the Oscar Arias administration in 2010.
On Wednesday and Thursday, 51 countries filed their climate action plans with the United Nations, a key step toward reaching an international accord at the Paris climate summit in December. Altogether, more than 130 nations accounting for about 85 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions have filed plans.
Inadequate national targets for curbing climate-altering greenhouse gases meant emissions would be "far above" the level required to stave off disastrous global warming, analysts warned Wednesday.
