{Blunderov]
Without at all wishing to flood the list, I thought I would present the
entire article as it appeared in the Johannesburg Star today.
There is quite a dramatic picture captioned:
<snip>
Troubled waters...tourists and locals look in awe from a hilltop vantage
point above the flooded town of Passau Bavaria in southern Germany,
yesterday. Heavy rain and swollen rivers have caused extensive damage in
the historic region and more rain is feared
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World weather chaos fuels impetus for summit
REUTERS AND SAPA AFP Berlin
Storm clouds over Europe causing some of the worst floods in decades,
might have a silver lining for environmentalists as the battle lines are
drawn for the Johannesburg World Summit.
Floods are threatening crops and historic buildings across Europe.
Hundreds of people have drowned in Nepal, Iran and the Philippines,
while drought has shriveled harvests in Southern Africa, Vietnam
Australia and the United States.
Ahead of the upcoming summit in Johannesburg on the environment and
development, Europeans have used the extreme weather as ammunition to
criticize US President George W Bush's rejection of moves to fight
global warming.
During a visit to the flooded Bavarian university town of Passau
yesterday, German Interior Minister Otto Schily said such disasters
showed the need for a redoubling of efforts to protect the environment.
German Environment Minister Jurgen Trittin agreed, saying ever higher
temperatures in recent decades had led to rising sea levels and heavier
rainfall.
Benedict Southworth, from the Greenpeace environmental group in Britain,
said temperature records were being broken across Europe, and extremes
would increase.
Gallus Cadonau, managing director of a Swiss foundation for the
preservation of rivers and streams, agreed, and suggested punitive
tariffs on imports from the US to force co operation on greenhouse gas
emissions.
UN Environment Programme chief Klaus Toepfer said the latest extreme
weather should persuade rich nations of the need to act fast to reduce
emissions of gases believed to contribute to global warming.
Toepfer rejected suggestions that a lack of US interest could render
irrelevant the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development that runs from
August 26 to September 4 in Johannesburg, although he admitted it might
disappoint. "We would like to go much further, but the world, cannot be
changed by one conference."
While the summit will host about 50 000 participants, including dozens
of world leaders, Bush is expected to be on holiday at his Texas ranch.
The United States produces a quarter of the world's carbon dioxide
emissions.
Bush pulled out of the Kyoto agreement on reducing greenhouse gases last
year, saying it would cripple the US economy.
Cato Buch, of the Norwegian environmental group Bellona, said there was
no proof of a direct link between erratic weather and greenhouse gases.
"We can't say 100% that this is linked to climate change, but scientists
agree that such dramatic weather is more likely if the greenhouse effect
is taking place," he said.
Germany's Trittin also said global warming was by no means the only
cause of the recent floods in Europe, and that building along river
banks and flood plains was also partly to blame.
In Romania, where 10 people have died as a result of bad weather in
recent weeks, Ion Simion, an adviser to the Environment Ministry, said
tree felling was also a problem "not only in Romania but everywhere".
Danica Leskova, from Slovakia's Hydrometeorological Institute, cautioned
against jumping to conclusions about a link between floods and global
climate change. "Our memory is too short," she said. "Our regular and
scientific observations did not begin long enough ago to make such
self-assured deductions, "There is one nice or ugly thing about nature:
it is un predictable."
Greenpeace has urged the world's oil giants to provide urgent financial
aid for those hit by the floods. The group said the companies were
partly to blame for emission of greenhouse gases.
Toepfer said: 'We have to do all we can to fight (this phenomenon) and
that is above all the duty of industrialised countries."
He added that Africa represented 14% of the world's population but
produced only 3,2% of it's carbon dioxide emissions, "yet it precisely
there that the effects climate change are so dramatic".
Greenpeace climate expert Karsten Smid said the oil industry wielded too
much influence on the US government and was torpedoing efforts to
restrict climate change. "The torrential rainfalls, hail storms and
hurricanes that we are seeing at present are the result of rampant
global warming," he maintained.
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