Manmohan Singh

New Delhi, Nov. 6: India today said it was not yet ready to quantify its carbon emission targets but would explore the possibility.

“We have not reached that stage (to quantify emission targets). We will explore that possibility,” Manmohan Singh said after an India-EU summit following which he addressed a news conference with Swedish Prime Minister and chairman of the Swedish presidency of EU, Fredrik Reinfeldt.

“All of us have an obligation to work together,” the Indian Prime Minister said. “We have a very ambitious national plan to combat climate change.”

Climate change figured prominently in discussions Singh had with the Swedish Prime Minister and European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso. Sweden now holds the EU presidency.

Reinfeldt pitched for India’s co-operation in forging a consensus at the crucial UN climate summit in Copenhagen that is just a month away.

“We have identified the costs of mitigation (of greenhouse gas emissions). We need 100 billion euros by the time we come to 2020. We have acknowledged there are ambitious plans in India, but we need action from everyone,” Reinfeldt said.

The EU finance ministers calculated at their summit last week that the world would need 100 billion euros a year to tackle global warming, but did not specify who would contribute how much for achieving this.

Developing countries, led by India, have consistently said this money must come from industrialised countries that are responsible for the major proportion of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

India has also consistently advocated the principle of common, but differentiated, responsibilities to tackle climate change. It wants greater carbon emission cuts by developed countries that should be legally binding, but not so for developing nations.

Singh said he had received no information from Pakistan over a reported Lashkar-e-Toiba terror plot to attack India and called for collective international action to combat terrorism in the region. “We have not received any information from Pakistan on this issue,” he said, when asked about a terror plot allegedly hatched by the Lashkar to attack India.

David Coleman Headley, a US citizen, and Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Pakistan-born Canadian citizen and a resident of Chicago, were arrested by the FBI on October 3. They were believed to be plotting an attack in India.

“We reviewed the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan and emphasised the need for concerted international action to combat terrorism. What happens in Afghanistan and Pakistan affects us intimately more than any other country in the world. We have vital stakes in the peace, progress and stability of not only Afghanistan but also Pakistan,” Singh said.

“We hope the international community will stay the course in meeting these problems. It requires collective efforts on part of the international community.”

Expanding counter-terror co-operation also figured prominently in discussions between Singh and the EU leaders at the day-long summit. “We have agreed to work towards an early finalisation of the agreement between Europol (the nodal criminal intelligence unit of the EU) and India,” Singh said.

“India and the EU stand together in combating terrorism which is a serious threat to international peace and security,” said Reinfeldt.