http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0905-02.htm
Published on Thursday,
September 5, 2002 by Inter Press Service
Tiny Tuvalu Steps up Threat to Sue Australia,
U.S.
by Kalinga Seneviratne
SYDNEY - The tiny Pacific
nation of Tuvalu is stepping up
its threat to sue Australia and the United States over
their greenhouse gas emissions, saying these are bound
to drown the island as warmer global temperatures send
sea levels rising.
During the World
Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD)
that ended in Johannesburg Wednesday, Tuvalu was busy lobbying
other island states around the world to help launch a World
Court lawsuit against the two developed nations.
Australia is the biggest
per capita producer of greenhouse
gases, and the United States is the world's single biggest
polluter of such gases. The two countries were isolated at
the WSSD, as the only two developed countries to refuse to
sign the 1997 Kyoto protocol that sets targets for them to
cut emissions of greenhouse gasses.
Tuvalu is a chain of
nine coral atolls whose highest point
is just 4 meters above sea level.
Many scientists argue
that the melting of the ice caps due
to rising global temperatures would push up the sea level,
putting small South Pacific nations at risk. Tuvalu is
expected to drown under the rising sea levels within
50 years, according to these scientific estimates.
These concerns drove
Tuvalu, which has a population of
10,000, to make a formal request last year to Australia
and New Zealand to open their doors for its citizens to
immigrate if they face imminent danger from sea level rise.
New Zealand agreed
to plan a 30-year immigration program,
but Australia's Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock said
this action was based on speculation.
''Why would I agree
with that?'' he asked. ''I think it is
on a 30, 40 or 50-year horizon, if it's going to occur at all.''
Blaming the poor environmental
records of Australia and the
United States for its plight, Tuvalu now wants to file a
lawsuit at the International Court of Justice in The Hague,
Netherlands.
Speaking to Radio Australia
during the Johannesburg summit,
Tuvalu's Finance and Planning Minister Bikenibeu Paeniu said
that his people are already fearful of rising sea levels and
that Australian scientific evidence provided so far does not
match the reality on the ground.
''For the first time
ever in my life that I have got scared
because with the data or what have happened so far in Tuvalu
doesn't seem to match the scientific data and information
that they do have in Australia,'' he said.
The lack of resources
in the Pacific has made island
nations vulnerable to what critics say could be the
manipulation of scientific data by developed nations,
though Australian officials dismiss this.
During a meeting in
Fiji last month of the 160-member
South Pacific Forum (SPF), a Pacific grouping that
includes Australia, Australian officials produced
results of an Australian Agency for International
Development (AusAID) study that revealed no scientific
evidence to support current claims by the islands on
sea level rise.
Instead, it pointed
to soil erosion as being the
cause of sea level rise.
Australia's Environment
Minister David Kemp has
dismissed Tuvalu's legal threat, arguing that Australia
contributes only 1 percent of global greenhouse gases.
''It is very much a
global issue,'' he said,
''and no country is doing more with the Pacific
Island countries than Australia to put them in a
position where they can adapt and assess the risks''.
During the WSSD, Australia
announced a 7.2 million
Australian dollar (3.9 million U.S. dollar) package
of ''partnership initiatives with our Pacific neighbors''.
This includes 4 million
Australian dollars (2.17 million
U.S. dollars) for a Pacific Island adaptation and vulnerability
initiative to help Pacific countries adapt to the future
impact of changing weather patterns. A smaller amount has
been set aside to help improve weather forecasting and to
set up climatic prediction services.
Fji's Prime Minister
Laisenia Qarase said his country
welcomed the ''partnership initiatives'' as the start
of a process of turning the WSSD summit outcomes into
practical initiatives or projects for implementation.
''It is the first opportunity
for the partners of the
Pacific to look at areas or concepts where they themselves
may wish to pursue practical partnerships with Pacific
governments, organizations and stakeholders,'' he said.
Australia's strong
opposition to the Kyoto agreement
is due to the strong lobbying by the fossil fuel industry,
says analysts here. Australia is the world's biggest
exporter of coal.
In June, Prime Minister
John Howard told parliament,
''For us to ratify the protocol would cost us jobs and
damage our industry. That is why the Australian
government will continue to oppose ratification.''
Still, he said, Australia would take its own measures
to try to meet its Kyoto targets.
According to U.N. Environment
Programme figures,
Australia emits about 27 tons of greenhouse gases
per person each year, and the United States over
6,700 million tons a year.
To reach the Kyoto
agreed targets, by 2010,
Australia needs to cut its greenhouse gas emissions,
mostly from industry, by 16.1 percent and the
United States by 24.3 percent.
Australia is still
behind its target. It is projected
to reach 111 percent of 1990 emissions by the end
of the decade -- still under its target of 108 percent
under the Kyoto accord. Still, data released by
Australian government in August said that the country
is ''within striking distance'' of its target.
Analysts here believe
that the threat of legal action
against Australia by Tuvalu is some way off, if at all.
But campaigns like that of Tuvalu, especially at venues
like the WSSD, help raise international awareness on
the issue of legal means to address climate change.
''The message to nations
like Australia is ignore
this issue at your own peril,'' Greenpeace International
campaigner Peter Tabuns told Radio Australia.
''Not only do you endanger the lives and well-being
of people in your own nation, but you risk action,
reaction, from other nations who are harmed by your
irresponsibility.''
© 2002 IPS
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