Bush Officials In Buenos Aires Even Opposed To Phrase "Climate Change"

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"The US successfully stymied concrete action at the Buenos Aires 10th UN climate change conference, which finished on Saturday, with a compromise for nations to meet informally next year and "exchange information". Due to pressure from the US, developing countries and oil-producing nations, the meeting is being billed as a "seminar" to emphasise that no decisions will be taken. Bush Administration officials at the conference opposed the use of the phrase "climate change", preferring the more benign term "climate variability".

A future accord, said Senator Campbell, must engage the US - responsible for almost a quarter of global emissions - and developing countries, which will be bigger polluters as their economies grow. "If we don't do that the world is in serious jeopardy," he said.

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Labor's environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese, welcomed Senator Campbell's shift but said hitching Australia's participation in an international treaty to US involvement was absurd. "The US have already said they won't participate," he said. "It's a bit weird. Australia shouldn't be using the US or any other nation as an excuse to not fully participate in the international response to climate change." Environmentalists, who called last week for Senator Campbell explicitly to reject the US position, said talk was easy and domestic action was needed to cut emissions. "Certainly we welcome the fact that Senator Campbell isn't just toeing the US line," said the Australian Conservation Foundation's energy reform campaigner, Erwin Jackson.

The UN conference, attended by 6000 delegates from almost 200 countries, started on a high after Russia's ratification revived the ailing Kyoto protocol. It ended with environmentalists' scorn. Oil-producing nations including Saudi Arabia resisted an aid package for developing countries such as small island states most vulnerable to climate change. Other developing countries resisted talk of cutting emissions because industrialised nations had not yet proved they could act to fix a problem they created."

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http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Australia-goes-cool-on-US-Kyoto-tactics/2004/12/19/1103391643032.html?oneclick=true