In July 2001 more than 160 governments came together in Bonn, Germany to complete the operating rules for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The Bonn conference was the resumed session of the Sixth Conference of the Parties (COP6), after last year’s session in The Hague ended in a deadlock between the European Union and the United States.
Ministers met behind closed doors, bilaterally and in working groups, attempting to piece together a deal while preserving their individual position. Finally, on July 23rd, delegates emerged from their meetings and reconvened in plenary. President Pronk reported that a compromise on compliance had been reached. The compliance text would be amended in three ways: the consequences of non-compliance to be applied by the enforcement branch would be aimed at ensuring “environmental integrity” rather than “reparation of damage to the environment”; the requirement that monetary payments be made to “repair damage to the environment” would be deleted; and the language on the adoption of binding consequences would be made much less specific. The COP would adopt the compliance regime at this session and would recommend to the first “Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties,” (the supreme body of the Protocol after it enters into force) that it adopt procedures and mechanisms relating to compliance “in terms of Article 18” (the Kyoto Protocol article dealing with compliance).