Washington Climate Meeting farce
The US’ continual disregard for setting firm targets for reducing emissions was once again demonstrated in the Washington conference last week. Bush failed to specify goals for reducing greenhouse gases, according to the New York Times. The meeting which was arranged by the Bush Administration to include several high emitting countries in order to create goals for clearing the skies for the post kyoto era left participating countries “less than impressed” by Bush’s talk. One applauded comment from the American President was to his statement that the US would participate in global warming negotiations overseen by the UN. Their main intentions, as mentioned in our recent post, are to increase the commitment from developing nations. Bush proposed an international fund to help developing nations to benefit from new technologies. The overall impression was that the talks were quite futile.
“Mr. Bush quickly left the auditorium after delivering his remarks, which ended 15 minutes ahead of schedule. Some of the delegates, representing the major industrialized nations plus Brazil, China, India and South Africa, said they were less than impressed.
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Mr. Vargas, a senior official in Brazil’s ministry of external relations, seemed puzzled by the purpose of the Washington meeting, which came at the end of a week when the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, pledged the organization’s full efforts toward negotiating a new agreement to take the place of the Kyoto Protocol after most of its provisions expire in 2012.
“The whole agenda was set by the American government,” Ambassador Vargas said. “The American government didn’t bring any new ideas, any new proposals in terms of the American position.”
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“We could have another 20 years of talking about talking,” Mr. Ashton said. “We need to start deciding about doing.”
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“It was a lost opportunity,” he said. “America needs to lead, and we can lead, but now the spotlight shifts to the Congress because the president has refused to accept the only path that’s ever solved an air pollution problem — and that’s mandatory legal limits.”
There are at least a half-dozen bills before Congress that would set such mandatory caps, as well as energy legislation passed by the House and Senate that would help curb greenhouse gases, which President Bush has threatened to veto.
Representative Edward J. Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts and the chairman of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, attended Friday’s speech.
“My fear is that the president has set aspirational goals that are really procrastinational,” he said.”