India wants richer countries to adopt “net negative” emissions targets and launched a broadside against the climate goals of big emitters in the EU and China, in a sign of how climate negotiations are heating up ahead of a UN summit this year.

Indian energy minister R K Singh told a virtual gathering of the world’s climate leaders that targets set for 2050 or 2060 were just “a pie in the sky”. He said that developing countries such as India should not be forced to cut their emissions to net zero.

In his speech delivered to peers such as US climate tsar John Kerry, Chinese energy minister Zhang Jianhua and EU climate minister Frans Timmermans at the summit hosted by the International Energy Agency and the UN COP26, Singh castigated their efforts.