George W Bush has staged his first major meeting on climate change in an attempt to persuade the world’s most polluting powers to avoid another Kyoto-style agreement on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.
The US president drew immediate fire from environmentalists and some participants at the two-day session at the White House for arguing that countries should voluntarily control carbon emissions, which are helping raise the Earth’s temperature.
By contrast, Bill Clinton, the former president, has been showered with praise during his Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York, which has attracted a host of world leaders past and present, socially aware celebrities and business figures.
It has also attracted vast donations, with Norway committing £500 million to improving children’s health, and non-governmental organisations committing hundreds of millions to solar energy, clean water and other causes. “We are faced with complex problems that government either is not solving or government alone cannot solve,” Mr Clinton said.
Mr Bush’s meeting is proving a less harmonious affair. In opening the two-day session, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, said the United States hoped that global warming could be reduced without stifling growing economies.
She restated the US position that nations should set their own goals to curb harmful emissions.
Expressing the European view, John Ashton, a special representative on climate change for Britain, said: “We can’t do this on the basis of talking about talking or setting goals to set goals. “We know that a voluntary approach to global warming is about as effective as a voluntary speed limit sign in the road.”
