China's top meteorological official has urged the international community to abide by the principle of "common but differentiated responsibility" when addressing climate change.

Zheng Guoguang, director of China Meteorological Administration (CMA), made the comments on Friday to Xinhua News Agency.

The principle of "common but differentiated responsibility" was established by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol.

It means all countries and people have a common obligation to protect the world's environment. However, due to each country's different development stages and capabilities, so does the degree of their obligation.

"The developed countries should be blamed most for global warming due to their greenhouse gas (GHG) emission in the past 200 years," Zheng said.

The UN benchmark report on climate change released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in February showed that 90 percent of climate change could be attributed to the use of fossil fuels.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) had been mostly released into the atmosphere by developed countries for their industrialization, Zheng said, adding that developed countries should do more to mitigate climate change.

The GHG emission per capita in OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries is three times than that of the Chinese people.

"Emissions from OECD countries are called 'luxury emissions'," Zheng said.

"But China, which has tens of millions of people trying to solve problems with basic living produces 'survival emissions'.

"So when addressing the responsibilities on curbing global warming, China is not in the same categories as the developed countries."

China, as one of the Annex II countries, has no obligation to reduce GHG emissions, according to Kyoto Protocol.

(China Daily June 9, 2007)