World>Terrorism & Security
posted June 20, 2005, updated 11:30 a.m.

Document: US wants climate statement 'watered down'

Leaked draft shows Bush won't let G-8 take strong stand on global warming.

By Tom Regan | csmonitor.com

Two weeks ago, the science academies of the G-8 countries (the world's leading industrialized nations: US, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Russia and Italy – as well as the science academies of Brazil, China and India) issued a joint statement that "called for prompt action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and warned that delays will be costly."

Now, the British newspaper, the Observer reports a draft statement about global warming, prepared for the upcoming G-8 summit in Scotland, was leaked to the British and US media last week. (The New York Times reported the dcument came from a European official close to the talks).

The draft statement shows that the Bush administration is engaged in an " extraordinary effort" to "undermine completely the science of climate change and show that the US position has hardened during the G-8 negotiations. They [the leaked documents] also reveal that the White House has withdrawn from a crucial United Nations commitment to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions."


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The documents show that Washington officials:

Removed all reference to the fact that climate change is a 'serious threat to human health and to ecosystems';

Deleted any suggestion that global warming has already started;

Expunged any suggestion that human activity was to blame for climate change. Among the sentences removed was the following: 'Unless urgent action is taken, there will be a growing risk of adverse effects on economic development, human health and the natural environment, and of irreversible long-term changes to our climate and oceans.'

Stephanie Long and Cam Walker of Friends of the Earth Australia, writing on the Australian commentary website Online Opinion point out that one of the biggest dangers of allowing global warming to go unchecked is that it will create a long-term refugee problem which would have direct consequences for issues like global security.

The Times of London reported on Saturday that the British government " played down the leak," but the Times also reported that the British, whose host this year's summit, are "frantically negotiating with their G-8 counterparts over the text of the final communiqué."

Several reports speculate that British Prime Minister Tony Blair is willing to water down the global warming section in return for Bush support on another of Mr. Blair's priorities - debt reduction in Africa.

But the Financial Times writes in an editorial that if it's true that Blair is making a deal with Bush on African relief, this would be " short-sighted but horribly ironic, since Africa is one of the principal victims of climate change."

It would be at best pointless, at worst positively damaging to proceed on the basis of this draft [leaked to the media], which leaves wide open whether global warming is a fact or a hypothesis. The US will not go the Kyoto route but nor will it fully mobilise its research and ingenuity around this problem until it recognises it as a world-changing phenomenon that can no longer be ignored.

News of the leaked documents comes the week after Exxon Mobil announced that Peter Cooney, chief of staff of the Bush administration's Council on Environmental Quality, would soon resign his position with the White House and work for Exxon.

Although Mr. Cooney said the move had been long planned, it came to light two days after The New York Times and the Government Accountability Project reported that he had "made changes [during final editing] in several government climate change reports that were issued in 2002 and 2003." The changes " consistently played down the certainty of the science surrounding climate change."

This past winter, the Independent reported that Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, the scientist the Bush administration had allegedly put in place at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change at the request of Exxon, "rocked" the administration when he told an environmental summit in Mauritius that "he personally believes that the world has 'already reached the level of dangerous concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere' and called for immediate and 'very deep' cuts in the pollution if humanity is to 'survive.' "

But columnist Frazer Nelson argues in The Scotsman that the efforts by the Bush administration may lead to " a sensible response to a complex situation. It could well be a Kyoto for grown-ups." He argues that America is already doing a lot to deal with global warming.

There are now thousands of facts backing up either side, but one political constant remains. Climate change is a politically-charged cause, close to the heart of anyone who dislikes free markets or the United States of America.
There is, however, another America which confounds this stereotype. President Bush has pledged to reduce US greenhouse gas intensities by 18% within 10 years – a tougher target than Kyoto-signing Britain, which has set a target of 12%. Bush's White House is pledged to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 500 tones over a decade – a bigger saving than the rest of Europe put together, albeit a smaller one than Kyoto's signatories envisaged.

One person whose doesn't think the Bush administration has done enough is Sen. John McCain (R) of Arizona. In an interview published in the May edition of Men's Journal, Sen. McCain said the Bush administration's legacy on the environment would be " very low." When asked what role the influence of major corporations had played in this issues, he replied, "...I'm not sure why there has been such great resistance in the Bush administration to do, you know, almost anything. It's terrible." On Sunday, on NBC's Meet the Press, Sen. McCain told host Tim Russert that the Bush administration will not leave a very good environmental legacy behind. He said although the White House had done admirable things with some environmental issues, "On the issue of climate change, I'm very disappointed."

I will tell you honestly, I am emotionally involved in the issue. And perhaps maybe I was too harsh in my comments in that interview [with Men's Journal], but I really feel very strongly about the issue. I've been to the Arctic. I've seen where the polar ice cap is melting. I've seen the effects of it. And I think we need to act. I really do. And by the way, I think it's one of the issues that causes problems between ourselves and Europeans.

The Globe and Mail reports that McCain and Sen. Joe Liebermand (D) of Connecticut have introduced a bill in the Senate that " would set a mandatory cap on US carbon emissions. 'You've got to have an immediate effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,' McCain said, adding that any climate change plan that doesn't do that is 'a fig leaf' and 'a joke.' "