The resignation last week of Yvo De Boer - as Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) - the UN organ responsible for designing the global framework for policy response to climate change, has cast more doubt on a multi-lateral approach to fighting one of man's most urgent problems.

Yvo, as he is fervently referred to by the greater movement of people that is pursuing a cohesive multi-national approach to climate change, announced he would step down in July 2010, and effectively bring an end to nearly four years as champion of a global movement to fighting climate change.

A statement published on the UNFCCC website said De Boer (pictured) was joining the consultancy firm KPMG as their lead climate change advisor.

However, his departure has already attracted condolences from leading environment bodies indicating that his departure could symbolise the death the UN process.

With nearly four years at the helm of the UN top climate change organ, Yvo, as evidenced by his resignation, had grown frustrated by the slow pace of progress in talks.

The failure of the Copenhagen climate summit, many bloggers have argued, could have instigated Yvo's resignation, especially given that his organisation and many scientists had pegged the international community's hopes of saving the planet on the December 2009 conference to finding a lasting, fair, global and legally binding answer to climate change.

Award-winning author Mark Lynas writing in the guardian.co.uk last week said: "These are dark times….the resignation of Yvo de Boer as executive secretary of the UN climate change secretariat today only compounds the sense of gathering crisis.

"De Boer has been a steady pair of hands guiding the international negotiations through some very rocky periods - not least the dramatic episode in Bali two years ago where he himself burst into tears on the plenary stage - and his trustworthy, solid presence will be sorely missed.

Despite the official denials, there can be little doubt that this resignation indicates his frustration at the general unraveling of the process that was so depressingly evident at Copenhagen."

The New York Times had hailed the initiative taken by President Obama to bring together some of the top emitters such as the US, China, EU, Brazil and India as a better way to breaking the deadlock evidenced by the difficulty of getting all 193 UN member countries to agree. But the deal, so called the Climate Accord, which he helped broker has been largely rejected.

As Lynas noted, the next few months look grim. The US congress, does not look set to have a climate change legislation soon. Without one, Obama can do nothing about climate change and without the US, it appears no country, not even the European Union that had shown leadership through the Kyoto Protocol, appears willing to sacrifice growth, as the US lags behind.

While it's no accident that Yvo had to leave under the prevailing circumstances, his departure in a way reflects the waning resilience of some of the best world's loudest voices of climate change. But it is also an admission that nothing more than a real catastrophe may be needed to happen for world leaders to wake up. But as scientists have warned, this may be too late.
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