Canada's image lies in tatters. It is now to climate what Japan is to whaling

Dec 07, 2009 22:49

Правительство Канады торпедирует борьбу за сохранение климата. В 2006 г. оно отказалось придерживаться своих обязательств по Киотскому договору. Ни одна другая страна, ратифицировавшая договор, такого не сделала. И вместо того, чтобы сокращать свои выбросы парниковых газов на 6% с 1990 до 2012 год, Канада их увеличила на 26! Сегодня, 7 декабря, активисты Гринпис вывесили на здании Парламента в Оттаве транспаранты с призывом к премьер-министру и лидеру оппозиции: «Харпер! Игнатьев! Бездействие в вопросе климата уносит жизни!»

The tar barons have held the nation to ransom. This thuggish petro-state is today the greatest obstacle to a deal in Copenhagen



Syncrude Oil Sands, Mine and Refinery, the world's largest oil sand operation producing crude oil at Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, October 20, 2001. Photograph: Greg Smith/Corbis

When you think of Canada, which qualities come to mind? The world's peacekeeper, the friendly nation, a liberal counterweight to the harsher pieties of its southern neighbour, decent, civilised, fair, well-governed? Think again. This country's government is now behaving with all the sophistication of a chimpanzee's tea party. So amazingly destructive has Canada become, and so insistent have my Canadian friends been that I weigh into this fight, that I've broken my self-imposed ban on flying and come to Toronto.

So here I am, watching the astonishing spectacle of a beautiful, cultured nation turning itself into a corrupt petro-state. Canada is slipping down the development ladder, retreating from a complex, diverse economy towards dependence on a single primary resource, which happens to be the dirtiest commodity known to man. The price of this transition is the brutalisation of the country, and a government campaign against multilateralism as savage as any waged by George Bush.

Continue reading the article
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/nov/30/canada-tar-sands-copenhagen-climate-deal



Ottawa, Canada - On the opening day of pivotal climate change negotiations in Copenhagen, 19 Greenpeace activists have occupied roofs on the Parliament Buildings to highlight the failure of Prime Minister Harper and Opposition Leader Ignatieff to help end the growing loss of human lives from the ever-worsening climate crisis.

See more:
http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/recent/occupy_parliaments_roofs

canada, environment

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