By Li Heng
When British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett held a special
discussion last month at the Security Council, most of the
developing countries rejected her argument that the environmental
threat is an international security issue.
Climate change might affect world security, but ultimately it is
a question of sustainable development, said Liu Zhenmin, the
Chinese deputy ambassador to the UN. Liu made the point that the
Security Council does not have the "professional competence" nor is
it the "right decision-making place" for extensive participation
leading up to widely acceptable proposals.
There is every reason to contain global climate change and
protect the environment, but Britain was playing an "environment
card" in an attempt to exert pressure on developing countries,
ignoring the principal perpetrators - rich countries including
itself.
Presently, climate change mainly refers to global warming.
According to a report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, there is more than a 90 percent possibility that global
warming in the past half century is related to the increase of
greenhouse gases generated by the human use of fossil fuel. No
doubt that 90 percent comes primarily from the major fossil fuel
consumers of the industrial developed countries.
As a matter of fact, ever since the 18th century industrial
revolution, Western countries have been sacrificing environmental
resources shared by human kind to build their wealth.
This reality is reflected in the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change. It laid down in 1992 "common but
differentiated responsibilities" in checking global warming - all
countries bear the responsibility, but the developed world has the
most responsibility.
The ordinary people of rich countries understand this. They have
demanded that their governments take urgent measures to address the
issue.
However, some developed countries' governments have been
neglecting public opinion and passing the buck. The United States,
the largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, refused to accept
the Kyoto Protocol to reduce emissions.
It set a bad example and other countries followed, including
Australia. Signed in 1997, the protocol only came into effect in
2005. During the intervening eight years, as climate change
advanced, rich countries bargained and squabbled over their share
of the responsibility.
One of the US excuses in refusing to implement the protocol is
that the document shuns 80 percent of the global population. What
this means is that the vast number of developing countries should
also bear the responsibility. The argument simply doesn't hold
water.
On top of the fact that rich countries are responsible for
today's global warming, these countries are even reluctant to give
the funds and technical support that developing countries need to
tackle the problem. Small wonder the United States is criticized by
the international community.
Global warming is an outcome of human activities rather than a
natural disaster. Without maximum action from the developed world,
all countries will be ultimately affected, including the rich
countries.
The author is an editor on the People's Daily
website.
(China Daily May 24, 2007)
