Co-Chairs

1. I have the honour to deliver this statement on behalf of the Group of 77 and China.

2. I wish to confirm the Group's commitment to work in a disciplined and constructive manner so that we can successfully fulfil our mandate from Durban by the end of this year. In this regard, the Group wishes to acknowledge the work that you have done inter-sessionally in preparing the Non-Papers containing a draft agreement and draft decisions, including on pre-2020 ambition.

3. The Group also welcomes the Co-Chairs' willingness to listen to the Group's views on the unacceptability of the Non-Papers as the basis for negotiations. We are pleased with the constructive and solution-oriented discussion we had with you bilaterally and with other Parties during your meeting with Heads of Delegations yesterday. As explained during those engagements, the Group of 77 and China is concerned that the text seems to attempt to rewrite, reinterpret and replace the Convention. It is extremely unbalanced and lopsided, to the extent that it jeopardizes the interests and positions of developing countries. We therefore concluded that the mandate given to the Co-Chairs was not fulfilled.

4. It is therefore a reassuring sign that our negotiating partners have heard our concerns and that we could agree to a pragmatic solution that would ensure that we are able to move forward to the real textual negotiation with urgency. We wish to note that now, more than ever, we need clarity on the mode of work to avoid further delays due to misunderstandings or misinterpretations of mandates.

5. The Group wishes to thank you for issuing your clarification note reflecting your understanding of what you heard from Parties regarding the manner in which we intend to proceed today.

6. On behalf of the Group, I wish to confirm our understanding of how we will proceed.

7. We expect to proceed in an Open-Ended Drafting Committee. We note that you are proposing a Contact Group should deal with this work.

8. The G77 and China agrees to work in a very disciplined manner and with restraint, limiting our insertions to the most esssential proposals from the Group.

9. At our meeting we will have the text on the screen and we will have a process of live editing of the text.

10. Parties will present their insertion orally and will also submit their inputs in written form to the Secretariat.

11. The reason for this approach is to avoid an exercise through which a compilation text is constructed.

12. We confirm that when the G77 has a common position, the sub-group within the G77 will not submit proposals. Sub-groups will only submit proposals when there is no common G77 position.

13. As soon as insertions are made, Spin-Off Groups can commence negotiations, on the text with the insertions.

Thank you