Cyber Voices Against Climate Change
22 August, 2000
Gland, Switzerland - As the days count down to November's crucial
climate summit in The Hague, a coalition of leading environmental
organizations today launched the first international web-based
initiative to give citizens around the world a voice in demanding
a halt to global warming.
The website www.climatevoice.org has been launched by 16
organizations, including WWF, Greenpeace and Friends of the
Earth. The site aims to send 10 million messages from the public
to world political leaders demanding that they use the November
summit to reduce the pollution that causes global warming.
"It is now 10 years since the international scientific community
issued its first warning about the threats the world faces from
climate change," said Andrew Kerr, of WWF's Climate Change
Campaign. "That's why we're aiming for 10 million messages - one
million for each year that governments have to failed to take
action. It is scandalous that available solutions to this
problem have been so thoroughly neglected."
In 1990, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
issued its first scientific report on rising levels of global
warming gases and their implications for the future. Though
impacts characteristic of global warming have since become
increasingly evident on every continent and in most nations,
governments have failed to act to turn down the heat. On the
contrary, many of the leading polluters, such as the United
States, have allowed their emissions to increase while pressing
for effective international measures to be watered down.
"Climate change is increasingly touching all of our lives. Food
production, water supply, shelter, public health, disaster
relief, and nature protection - all of these will be in the
firing line," said Roger Higman, Senior Campaigner with Friends
of the Earth. "We urgently need the intervention of top
politicians to give this problem the priority it deserves."
At www.climatevoice.org visitors can e-mail world leaders
expressing their concern about global warming. The first targets
on the site will be European Union Heads of State and Prime
Ministers. Visitors can also download a petition that can be
signed and sent off-line. They can then send a cyber
postcard to friends encouraging them to join the campaign. The
site is being launched in English today. Versions will follow in
French, Spanish and German.
At November's climate summit, officially the Sixth Conference of
the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change,
governments must meet their deadline for finalizing rules for
operating the Kyoto climate treaty - the only international
agreement for reducing emissions of global warming gases from the
industrialised world. Failing to agree in November would make it
questionable whether nations would be able to achieve the
Kyoto timetable for reducing emissions in the coming decade. This
would set the worst possible example for stopping global warming
in the 21st century.
"It's time world leaders recognised that the people who voted
them in care about a cleaner, safer future for their families,"
said Karl Mallon of Greenpeace's Climate Campaign. "People want
action now to combat global warming. November's climate summit -
the first of the 21st century - is the time for politicians to
show they listen."
For further information:
Andrew Kerr, WWF Climate Change Campaign. Tel: +31 6 5161 9462
Roger Higman, Senior Campaigner (Climate and Transport), Friends
of the Earth. Tel: +44 20 7566 1661
Karl Mallon, Climate Change Campaigner, Greenpeace International,
Tel: + 31 20 523 6291
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