European Union plans to charge airlines for carbon emissions are "discriminatory" and violate global laws, a group of 26 countries as well as the United States and China said in a joint declaration released by the Indian govt.
India, which hosted a two day meeting in New Delhi this week, said delegates from the non EU countries, which are too members of the U.N.'s International Civil Aviation Organization ICAO.L executive council, accepted to lodge a formal protest against the EU's new rules at the council's next gathering.
"There was large concern expressed by all countries present, without exception, that the unilaterally imposed EU (emissions trading scheme) measures were conflicting with the international legal regimes," the statement said.
"The legal debilities in the EU laws were pointed out. It was affirmed by the various delegates that they were also discriminatory (to) carriers."
The EU says it wants to put a price on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to guard against futurity climate impacts such as crop failures, droughts or flooding.
It has established an emissions trading scheme ETS.L to assist it cut carbon dioxide emissions, which it has pledged to decrease by 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.
As of January 2012, airlines flying into or out of EU airports will have to surrender permits to cover up all the CO2 they emit throughout the entire flight. They join some 11,000 factories and power plants already in the $100 billion market.
ICAO said the issue of aviation in the EU ETS is on the schedule for the 190-nation body's next meeting in November, where the group of 26 countries said they will submit a working paper on with their joint statement in opposition of the scheme.
Critics as well as the 26 opposing governments have called the "unilateral" scheme illegal, saying it breaches the Chicago Convention on international aviation as well as some provisions under the World Trade Organization WTO.L.
Three U.S. airlines are presently challenging the EU plans in Europe's highest court, which is due to provide its first opinion on the case on October 6.
NOT BACKING OFF
Although opposition to the EU's aviation policy is getting more blatant, the bloc's executive indicates no signs of yielding.
"The EU is not allowing for backing down," an EU spokesman told, adding up that the bloc's executive support other countries to in its place adopt similar emissions reducing goals.
The EU keeps that it could exempt airlines from countries that have adopted climate policies took for equivalent to Europe's targets.
But some nations have flouted at the offer and retaliated instead through other means, saying aviation should be regulated on a global level by measures approved by all ICAO members.
China blocked a $3.8 billion aircraft buy by Hong Kong Airlines from France-based Airbus (EAD.PA) at the Paris air show in June, sources said, adding to worries of a brewing trade war.
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