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Clinton faults Bush policy on climate change

David Adam

White House stung by criticism of its stance on Kyoto agreement

Montreal: The White House was forced into a U-turn on climate change on Saturday after appearing to misjudge critically the international and domestic mood on its efforts to tackle global warming.

After American delegates walked out of the United Nations climate change conference in Montreal over the wording of a draft statement calling for international co-operation on the issue, they signed a revised version after making only "trivial" changes.

One senior British official said the U.S. negotiators shifted their position on the joint statement because the Bush administration was stung by criticism of its stance in the U.S. press. "Washington is really feeling the heat on this," the official said.

The chief U.S. negotiator Harlan Watson walked out of talks on Friday after complaining that draft text proposals amounted to a call for negotiations which President George W. Bush opposes.

The U.S. delegation submitted its revised version of the statement text early on Saturday, but made only superficial changes, said European negotiators.

The change came after a well-received conference speech from former President Bill Clinton, in which he said that Mr. Bush's main reason for not joining Kyoto — that it would damage the U.S. economy — was "flat wrong".

Mr. Clinton said if the U.S. "had a serious effort to apply clean energy and energy conservation technologies... we could meet and surpass the Kyoto targets in a way that would strengthen our economies". Global warming could lead to a future climate conference being held on "a raft somewhere". —

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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