From REUTERS
US President George W. Bush unveiled his plans for tackling climate change Thursday.For months, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been trying to hammer out an agreement to combat climate change that all members of the G-8 could agree with. For just as long, the US has been resisting any agreement that involves a commitment to concrete emissions-reduction goals.
On Thursday, US President George W. Bush took the offensive, and unveiled his own proposal for combating global warming. He would like to see the world's 15 worst emitters of greenhouse gases -- including the US, China, India, Brazil, Australia, South Africa, Mexico, South Korea and Russia in addition to a number of European countries -- hold a series of meetings beginning this autumn aimed at setting a long-term global goal for reducing emissions.
Bush's plans are likely to be seen as a setback for Merkel, who wanted to reach an agreement on climate change at the G-8 summit. The timing of the speech, coming just days before the start of the June 6-8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, is seen as significant. Tension between the US and German governments has been mounting in the run-up to the summit, where global warming will be one of the main topics on the agenda.
Merkel wants a commitment from the world's richest nations to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) this century and to cut global greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.
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