A Bulgarian lawyer, Alexander Kodzhabashev, has been elected as a member of the enforcing authority of the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Committee.

The news was reported Tuesday by Bulgaria's Minister of Environment and Waters, Nona Karadzhova, who said this is huge recognition for the country, particularly in the light of its revoked, some time ago, accreditation to trade emissions by the same body.

Karadzhova stressed that Kodzhabashev is an attorney with extensive experience in environmental issues and in applications of conventions. The enforcing authority involves just 10 countries from the total of 193, which have signed the protocol.

The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC or FCCC), aimed at fighting global warming. The Protocol was initially adopted on 11 December 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, and entered into force on 16 February 2005. Under the Protocol, 37 countries ("Annex I countries") commit themselves to a reduction of four greenhouse gases (GHG) (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, sulphur hexafluoride) and two groups of gases (hydrofluorocarbons and perfluorocarbons) produced by them, and all member countries give general commitments.

It was reported earlier Tuesday that Canada is invoking its legal right to formally withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol, thus becoming the first country to leave the pact on cutting carbon emissions.

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