Bush (Dick Tater) g-8 global warming imc video

Climate change: Bush under pressure to declare his hand

PARIS, Feb 28 (AFP) -

The administration of US President George W. Bush will come under
intensifying pressure at a Group of Eight (G8) meeting this weekend to finally
declare its policy on the world's greatest environment threat.

At a G8 environment ministers' meeting in Trieste, Italy, the US will be lobbied
to commit itself clearly to the Kyoto Protocol, the troubled, still-incomplete
treaty on global warming.

"Everybody is paying close attention to whether Washington will make its stance
clear," a Japanese environment ministry official in Tokyo said. "(...) During our
preparation meetings, we have not seen any clear message."

In the past few weeks, the UN's top scientists on climate change have published
new studies concluding that the Earth's atmosphere is warming faster than
expected, thanks to the reckless burning of fossil fuels.

If nothing is done, potentially catastrophic climage change lies a few decades down the road, they warn.

The big question, though, is how Bush will respond.

Kyoto, the sole vehicle for dealing with global warming, has been in limbo since last November. Efforts to
complete the treaty broke up amid angry finger-pointing between the US, the biggest emitter of fossil-fuel
gases, and the European Union (EU).

The hope, declared in the wreckage of the negotiations, was to revive and conclude the process within
the next six months.

But Bush, a Texas ex-oilman who opposed Kyoto while on the campaign trail, has left everyone guessing
whether he will return to the negotiating table -- possibly with a toughened set of demands -- or let the
skeletal treaty die a slow death.

Kyoto has been condemned by US conservatives as a costly and meddlesome attempt to wean the
American economy away from oil. They have also attacked the treaty for requiring only developed
countries, and not developing countries such as India and China, for trimming their output of fossil gases.

Sensing these threats, the EU is contemplating a desperation move: ratifying and even implementing the
treaty without the US.

Sources said that, at the request of Italy, EU signatories of Kyoto have been asked to push ahead with
ratifying the treaty, in a grand gesture, in time for a 2002 UN gathering to review progress since the
famous Earth Summit in Rio in 1992.

"A clear (US) commitment (about Kyoto) is the only sign that the Europeans could get from this meeting.
If nothing happens, that means they have to go on their own," said Giulio Voldi of the Worldwide Fund
for Nature (WWF)

The Trieste meeting, taking place from Friday to Sunday, will also look at preparations for next year's
"Rio + 10" meeting in Johannesburg, where the emphasis will be on sustainable development, and look at
environment-related illnesses.

A draft copy of the final communique, acquired by AFP, will say the G8 is closely following the issue of
depleted uranium shells fired in the Balkans conflict.

The shells have triggered fears of a "Balkans syndrome" among peacekeepers stationed in Bosnia and
Kosovo.

The G8 comprises Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States.