Merkel says US could join UN on climate change

Berlin, June 4: German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she believed the United States could be brought into a UN process to combat climate change at this week's summit of leaders of the Group of Eight industrialised nations.

Speaking three days after US President George W Bush announced his own climate strategy, described by some critics as an affront to German plans, Merkel said Bush's ideas would make talks at the summit more interesting.

Merkel, who hosts the June 6-8 summit in the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm, has acknowledged she will probably not achieve her goal of winning a commitment to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius, not least because of Washington's opposition.

The chancellor wants next week's summit to prepare the ground to extend the Kyoto Protocol before a UN conference in Bali, Indonesia in December but Bush has so far shunned efforts by the world body.

Asked in an interview if she saw signals coming from Washington that led her to think Bush could get involved in the UN process on climate change, Merkel said there was a chance.

''We are arguing over the formulations to make that clear. But I think we have a chance and (if it happens), we would have achieved something which we have worked on for many years,'' Merkel told German broadcaster ARD.

The chancellor has said it is ''non-negotiable'' that the United Nations must lead global efforts on climate change.

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The United States has refused to adopt the UN-sponsored Kyoto Protocol, backed by 35 nations, which calls for an average cut in emissions of five percent below 1990 levels by 2008-2012.

Bush's new strategy looks beyond the G8 summit of rich nations by setting a deadline of the end of next year for a deal between top emitters including the United States, China, Russia and India.

Critics say he is bypassing the United Nations.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, also a fierce campaigner for tackling climate change within the United Nations, said at a joint news conference with Merkel it was good that Washington had committed itself to be part of a global agreement and to the goal of a substantial reduction in emissions.

''However, we need to go further. We need to make sure we set a clear global target, to make sure it can allow us within the UN framework to get a global agreement and then to set out how we will get to that target,'' he told reporters.

''There is still long way to go but three or four years ago we weren't anywhere near this stage.'' But Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, who will also attend the summit, stressed the differences between Europe and the United States.

''I think we have to underline again that this (climate change) has to be tackled at a global level. That's the difference between the Americans and the Europeans now,'' Prodi told French media.

''We are ready to accept decisions of a restrictive, quantitative nature. The Americans aren't yet.''

Reuters>