US Rejects Kyoto
Pact
By AFP
24 October , 2004
Agence France Presse
The United States, flying in the face
of snowballing world opinion, said it would not follow Russia's lead
and ratify the Kyoto protocol on global warming.
"We have no
intention of signing or ratifying it. We have not changed our views,"
a defiant deputy State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said after the
European Union and environmentalists across the globe hailed Moscow's
decision and urged Washington to follow suit.
Heading the chorus
of delight after the Russian cabinet approved the Kyoto pact and sent
it to lawmakers for ratification was the EU, which has been battling
to save the accord thrown into disarray by the US walkout.
"This is a
huge success for the international fight against climate change,"
declared European Commission President Romano Prodi. "Today (Russian)
President (Vladimir) Putin has sent a strong signal of his commitment
and sense of responsibility.
"We are happy
that the Russian Duma has decided to ratify. We hope that the United
States will now re-consider its position."
But the State Department
left no room for hope.
"We note the
actions taken today," said Ereli, "but I'd refer you to the
Russians for opinion or comment on their rationale for ratifying it.
Our position against it remains the same."
EU Environment Commissioner
Margot Wallstroem said Russia's action "sends a very forceful signal
to the rest of the world... It is also very much a victory for the European
Union."
German Foreign Minister
Joschka Fischer, a Green party member, said, "For the first time
there can be global responsibility for the world's climate and the management
of its resources."
"This is an
important signal to the entire international community," said German
Environment Minister Juergen Trittin, also a Green, the junior partner
in Germany's governing coalition.
French Ecology Minister
Serge Lepeltier said he was "delighted."
And Greenpeace International
campaigner Steve Sawyer said US President George W. Bush, whose rejection
of Kyoto in 2001 pushed the pact toward extinction, was now isolated.
Getting Russia on
board, he said, dealt "a major blow to President Bush and his paymasters
in the fossil fuel industry.
"His administration
and other climate criminals like Exxon-Mobil have failed in their attempt
to wreck Kyoto, even going so far as to suppress the work of their own
scientists."
On the other side,
Frank Maisano, a Washington lobbyist for the US utilities industry,
dismissed the Russian move as "largely symbolic," and called
the treaty "meaningless, ineffective and toothless."
And Japanese industry
fretted over the economic cost of meeting anti-pollution targets and
doubted whether Kyoto was workable.
"It is questionable
if the treaty, which commits only one-third of the world's countries
to obligations, will prove effective while the United States and China
stay out of it," said Yuzo Ichikawa, executive director of the
Japan Iron and Steel Federation.
China is a Kyoto
member but as a developing country does not have to meet specific targets
for cutting emissions.
Russia's ratification
is vital for transforming Kyoto from a draft 1997 agreement into a working
international treaty. Moscow had for years hedged on whether it would
approve the pact.
The Protocol requires
industrialized signatories to trim output of six "greenhouse"
gases by 2008-2012 compared with their 1990 levels.
In the United States,
in the throes of a hotly contested presidential race just days from
the November 2 election, Democratic challenger John Kerry made little
effort to distance himself from incumbent Bush, saying Kyoto "is
not the answer."
"The near-term
emission reductions it would require of the United States are unfeasible,
while the long-term obligations imposed on all nations are too little
to solve the problem," he said on his website.
Bush, in the second
debate on October 8, said, "Had we joined the Kyoto treaty...it
would have cost America a lot of jobs. It's one of these deals where,
in order to be popular in the halls of Europe, you sign a treaty...I
think there's a better way to do it."
Kerry at the time
had accused Bush of not "living in a world of reality with respect
to the environment.
"The fact is
that the Kyoto treaty was flawed," he said. "But this president
didn't try to fix it. He just declared it dead...and we walked away
from the work of 160 nations over 10 years."
© Copyright
2004 AFP