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China was named Good Guy at the UN climate change negotiations in Bali on Friday, Malaysia was condemned to join Saudi Arabia, Japan and Canada in the Bad Guys group and Australia and India were told to make up their minds which category they wanted to be in.Hans Verolme, director of the climate change programme at WWF, was the man responsible for the naming and shaming.He was particularly critical of Malaysia’s stance, which he condemned as "not politically acceptable."He told a media briefing on Friday morning, on the fifth day of the two-week conference, that Malaysian delegates were even questioning the climate change science that underpinned the negotiations and saying that they needed more time to study the scientific reports.It was a delaying tactic, said Verolme, perhaps stemming from fear that Malaysia might be asked to do more to combat climate change.Yet other "emerging economies" had agreed to take action, he pointed out, and the Malaysian Prime Minister had been positive about the need for action when he spoke at the recent Commonwealth Summit in Uganda.He said officials needed to sort out their position with the Prime Minister.

Australia, too, needed to make up its mind, said Verolme. The new government was sending positive signals, such as signing up to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, but it wasn’t clear that the negative line followed by the previous government had been dropped.

[An Australian NGO later told OneWorld.net that part of the confusion might lie in the continuation in office of civil servants closely identified with the previous government’s policy.)

He said he did not believe Japan was serious about the negotiations and he criticised Canada because in Parliament ministers talked about committing to actions that would stop global temperatures rising more than 2 degrees "but what it is doing here in Bali is more like 4 degrees."

India, he said, had been relatively quiet in the negotiations: "They are hesitating. I have a sense that they will not stand in the way of an agreement but that they have doubts."

Verolme praised the least developed countries for "for speaking up in a very constructive way", but his fullest praise went to China for its positive, constructive, flexible, open attitude at the talks.

Asked why China had dropped what had been widely perceived as a negative stance in earlier discussions, he said that about a year ago the government had decided to get serious about the issue because the country was already feeling the impact of climate change.