Brussels, 03/11/2009 (Agence Europe) - Climate change is high on the agenda of the EU-US Summit in Washington on Tuesday 3 November, the day after European Council President Fredrik Reinfeldt held bilateral talks with US President Barack Obama (see article above). It is now clear that, despite his best desires, it will be difficult for President Obama to make commitments on ambitious emissions reductions without the US Senate's backing of the climate bill.
A few hours before the EU-US Summit, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso stressed the importance of finding a collective solution to the challenge of global warming. “We must tackle together the challenge of climate change which threatens our livelihood and security. It is paramount that we push our negotiators to find solutions at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December,” he said in a press release.
External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero Walder saids this Summit “comes at a moment when the EU is close to undergoing the most extensive changes in its foreign policy structures which will make us a stronger, more coherent and more efficient partner in the world”.
Friends of the Earth (FoE) call on President Obama to merit the Nobel Prize he received for his efforts in international diplomacy. The NGO says that, instead of cooperating efficiently on resolving the climate crisis, the US administration is undermining existing agreements and allowing rich nations to sidestep the responsibility they have to lead by example in efforts on the climate crisis. While the openness shown by Obama on international diplomacy and negotiations is a welcome change, it has to be translated into tangible action, FoE says. Change we can believe in is not the pursuit of the Bush era climate policy, says Kate Horner, a political analyst with FoE US. To merit his Nobel Prize, President Obama must end this isolationist nonsense and undertake to act cooperatively to resolve the climate crisis, she went on. (A.N./transl.rt)