The UK Government alongside green lobby and campaign groups have reacted to today's announcement that Yvo de Boer will resign his position as Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC).
Commenting on the resignation, Friends of the Earth's International Climate Campaigner Asad Rehman said: "Yvo de Boer's departure will echo the frustration felt by millions around the world at the failure in Copenhagen.
"But the UN is the only legitimate body that can forge effective and fair international action to tackle climate change.
"De Boer's resignation must not be seen as an opportunity to strike weak and dangerous climate deals outside of the UN process as we saw in Copenhagen.
"What is needed now more than ever is a strong and fair global agreement in line with the very real risks we all face.
"Yvo de Boer's successor must not be afraid to hold rich countries to task for their failure to set real emissions targets - it is their legal and moral responsibility to cut emissions first and fastest."
Friends of the Earth is calling for rich countries to increase their level of ambition to cut their emissions by at least 40 per cent by 2020, without carbon offsetting. This is the minimum the science says is required.
The green campaigning charity wants rich countries to reaffirm their commitment to the Kyoto Protocol, under which rich countries accept their responsibility for causing climate change and agree to cut their emissions first and fastest.
Greeting the news of De Boer’s resignation, Steve Howard, CEO of international non-profit The Climate Group said, "Yvo De Boer has worked tirelessly to break the political deadlock around a fair and effective global climate deal. The international community owe him an enormous debt of gratitude for the real progress that has been made in international negotiations over the past four years.
"However, a change of leadership in the UNFCCC provides a fresh opportunity to re-energise international negotiations ahead of the UN climate summit in Mexico in December.
"The role will crucial to safeguarding our climate and our future economy and whoever gets the job will need to continue to build greater levels of trust, leadership and ambition between major economies and all nations to secure a fair and effective global climate agreement."
Earlier, the UK Government’s Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband said: “Yvo de Boer's patient work helped produce the Copenhagen Accord which contains commitments covering 80 percent of global emissions, something never previously achieved.
“We must quickly find a suitable successor, who can oversee the negotiations and reform the UNFCCC to ensure it is up to the massive task of dealing with what are some of the most complex negotiations ever."
Former Dutch civil servant Yvo de Boyo stepped down after four years in the post, which culminated in the weak accord of December's UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.
The married father-of-three said today he was quitting his post to take up a position with global accounting firm KPMG.
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