http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1206-07.htm
Published on Saturday,
December 6, 2003 by the BBC
Demand for 'Kyoto tax' on the US
QUOTE:
"We are about half a century away from being ecologically
and economically bankrupt because of global warming."
Andrew Simms, New Economics Foundation
Countries refusing to cut their emissions of greenhouse gases
should face trade sanctions, according to a British independent
think-tank.
The United States has
not signed the Kyoto agreement on climate
change and Russia has indicated it may follow.
The New Economics Foundation
wants the EU to tax imports from
these countries because they enjoy a competitive disadvantage
as energy costs increase.
Signed-up countries are currently meeting in Italy to discuss
the treaty.
New Economics Foundation
spokesman Andrew Simms told BBC Radio 4's
Today program EU countries would be within their rights to "work
out the cost of the free ride America is getting" and raise
that
amount.
"There are very
few signals the United States understands
- they do understand economic signals," Mr Simms added.
"There is only
a certain amount of time people can go around
behaving like teenagers who don't have to care about anybody
else," he told Today.
"We are about
half a century away from being ecologically
and economically bankrupt because of global warming."
The British diplomat
who proposed environmental sanctions
20 years ago, Sir Crispin Tickell, told the program the
United States' refusal to sign the United Nations Climate
Change Convention was the "height of irresponsibility".
The protocol, negotiated
to implement the convention, requires
industrialized countries to cut their emissions of six gases
which scientists believe are exacerbating natural climate
change.
Signatories will by
some time between 2008 and 2012 have
to cut emissions to 5.2% below their 1990 levels.
But many scientists
say cuts of around 60-70% will be needed
by mid-century to avoid runaway climate change.
The protocol will enter
into legal force when 55 signatories
have ratified it, including industrialized countries responsible
for 55% of the developed world's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions
in 1990.
Some critics say President
Bush's decision that the US, which
emits more greenhouse gases than any other country, would not
ratify the protocol has already condemned it to irrelevance.
The agreement faces
collapse without ratification from Russia,
which is responsible for 17% of global emissions, but seems
to be pulling away from backing it because it says it will
limit economic growth.
A senior Russian adviser
said the country would not sign
the agreement, although another minister then said he
supported it.
©2003 BBC
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