The European Union yesterday threatened to boycott talks among
top greenhouse gas emitting nations hosted by the United States,
accusing Washington of blocking goals for fighting climate change
at UN talks in Bali.
"If we would have a failure in Bali, it would be meaningless to
have a major economies' meeting" in the United States, Humberto
Rosa, Portugal's Secretary of State for Environment, said on the
penultimate day of the two-week talks.
"We're not blackmailing," he said, ratcheting up a war of words
with Washington at the 190-nation meeting.
"If no Bali, no MEM (major economies' meeting)."
Portugal holds the rotating EU presidency and Rosa is the EU's
top negotiator in Bali, where delegates are seeking to agree to
launch talks on a broad new climate treaty to combat floods,
droughts, heatwaves and rising seas from 2012.
Washington, long at odds with many of its Western allies on
climate policies, has called a meeting of 17 of the world's top
emitters in Hawaii late next month to discuss long-term curbs on
greenhouse gases.
The December 3-14 Bali talks are split over the guidelines for
starting two years of formal negotiations on a deal to succeed the
Kyoto Protocol, a UN pact capping greenhouse gas emissions of all
industrial nations except the United States until 2012.
The EU wants Bali's final text to agree a non-binding goal of
cuts in emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels, of 25 to 40
percent below 1990 levels by 2020 for industrial economies. The
United States, Japan and Canada are opposed, saying any figures
would prejudge the outcome.
Former US vice-president Al Gore won applause on the sidelines
of the talks by adding his voice to criticisms of Washington.
"My own country, the United States, is principally responsible
for obstructing progress in Bali," he said.
(China Daily December 14, 2007)
