China will release its first national plan on climate change next week amid international criticism that it is not doing enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Chinese officials reaffirmed Beijing's rejection of compulsory caps on emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that scientists say are heating the planet.
Beijing official
They said the blueprint was tentatively due to be published on June 4th, two days before President Hu Jintao attends a meeting of Group of Eight leaders in Germany at which global warming will be high on the agenda.
"A mandatory quota for China now would not be fair, and therefore China cannot accept that," said one official.
China looks set to become the world's top emitter of carbon dioxide this year or next -
just as serious talks start to extend the UN-sponsored Kyoto Protocol on global warming beyond 2012.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel hopes the G8 summit, in the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm, will pave the way for an extension of the protocol by agreeing on concrete steps to tackle emissions.
China's objection to mandatory caps, which is shared by the United States, underscores the difficulty she faces, however.
Beijing argues that rich nations pumped out most of the carbon dioxide already accumulated in the atmosphere and so they should cut their own emissions rather than push poorer nations to accept caps that could constrict their growth.
"Developed countries are to blame for climate change, but resolving this issue needs co-operation among all countries based upon on their different responsibilities, their capacity and their level of economic development," another official said.
China's emissions per capita of its 1.3 billion population are only one-fifth as high as those of the United States, officials said.
Between 1991 and 2005 China reduced the amount of energy used to produce each unit of GDP by 47 per cent - a conclusion corroborated by the Paris-based International Energy Agency.