ET Monday 9 April 2001 EU steps back from fight with Bush over Kyoto

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in Brussels THE European Union backed away from a confrontation with America on global warming yesterday, agreeing to modify parts of the Kyoto Protocol to meet Washington's concerns. Romano Prodi, the European Commission's president, said it would be better to try to salvage something from the agreement of 1997 to curb greenhouse gas emissions rather than tear up the accord. In an article for the press in Sweden, the current holder of the European Union presidency, he said: "If certain parts of the agreement prevent the United States from ratifying it, we should negotiate about those parts rather than bury the entire agreement." The change of tack came as a union mission prepared to visit Tokyo to secure the backing of key Asian states for the protocol. It suggests that Brussels is having second thoughts about the wisdom of trying to "shame" America by seizing the moral high ground and forming a coalition with the rest of the world to save Kyoto. The European environment commissioner, Margot Wallstrom, took a hard line last week, warning the Americans that they would be excluded from global talks and banned from the proposed system for trading emissions quotas. There is a growing feeling in Brussels, however, that the union has over-played its hand, picking a needlessly acrimonious fight with the Bush administration. Union officials say President Bush is being honest in declaring the Kyoto protocol unworkable. They say the accord faces insurmountable opposition in the US Senate because it exempts 80 per cent of the world's people and would oblige America to cut CO2 emissions sharply on the brink of a recession. Richard Armitage, America's Deputy Secretary of State, said at the weekend that the Bush team would outline new proposals intended to include other main polluting nations such as China.

-- Anonymous, April 08, 2001