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CLIMATE SUMMIT UPDATE

02 Nov 1998

In Kyoto, Japan, last year, industrialised countries agreed to action to fight dangerous climate change. One year on, in Buenos Aires, Governments are starting to backslide, with the world's richest countries trying to renege on their commitments and shift the burden of action to developing countries. Yet the industrialised countries use far more than their fair share of world's fossil fuel resources, and more than the planet's climate system can safely sustain.

Leading the retreat from Kyoto is the United States, where carbon dioxide emissions per person are more than 20 times the figure for India. By demanding that developing nations deal with their emissions while the US goes on polluting, the US is claiming that Americans have more rights than citizens of the developing world.

Friends of the Earth International calls this carbon injustice.

The US and other developed nations are fuelling climate change by putting money into huge fossil fuel projects in the developing world, through the World Bank and other international financial institutions. The World Bank invests 100 times more money in fossil fuel projects than in clean, renewable energy projects.

Friends of the Earth International calls this carbon hypocrisy.

Commenting, Liana Stupples of Friends of the Earth International said:

"Action to fight dangerous climate change must begin at home, in the rich industrialised countries. It's only fair that the countries that pollute the most should act first. Every citizen of the world deserves an equal right to development, but in the long term every nation has to agree to work within the climate's limits. With the political will and the right policies, this needn't cost jobs or damage economies. It will be good for people and good for the environment. That's carbon justice".