Adapted from IMC-Climate
GENOA , ITALY – The three-day G8 summit in Genoa, Italy finished July 22, 2001.
World leaders conceded they were unable to resolve U. S. and European differences over global warming.
The draft of the leaders’ final statement says all of the Group of Eight countries “firmly agree” on the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but “there is disagreement on the Kyoto Protocol and its ratification,” The Associated Press reports.
The hope that the G8summit would offer away out for the failing climate negotiations in Bonn has been smashed. Once again it becomes clear: present world leaders are only interested in short term economic progress.
The Kyoto pact is aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming. It was negotiated in 1997 by the U. S. and major industrialized nations, but U. S. President George W. Bush has since rejected it.
The G8 summit, which cost in itself $110 million (US), went together with protests by a hundred thousand people from all over Europe. Police forces have been extremely brutal. Hundreds of activists were beaten into the hospital, many of them seriously injured.