Robert T Watson of the US got elected as the next chairperson of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) at its 12th session held in Mexico from September 11 to 13. Watson will co-chair the IPCC with the present incumbent Bert Bolin till September 1997 when the latter's term would come to an end. India had boycotted the meet, sulking over having only one candidate in the fray.

The IPCC was founded in 1988 under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Meteorological Organisation with the mandate to assess the scientific and technical information about global climate change..

The search committee to elect a new chairperson to the IPCC was set up in April 1996 with only one candidate