Australia urged the United States yesterday to support a fresh approach to curbing global warming, following Washington's decision to reject the Kyoto accord.
The Australian Environment Minister, Mr Robert Hill, said the Prime Minister, Mr John Howard, had written to President Bush stressing the importance of programmes to genuinely reduce greenhouse emissions.
Speaking from New York where he has been attending talks on the issue with US and international officials, Mr Hill also conceded the Kyoto Protocol appeared doomed without the support of the United States.
"They're 25 per cent of greenhouse emissions, they are the world's largest economy," he said, adding that he did not believe Europe or Japan would separately ratify it if Washington did not.
Australia produced less than 2 per cent of gases.
"The prime minister wants us to work with the US and others towards getting all nations in the loop, agreeing to domestic programmes that really will genuinely start to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions," he said. Mr Hill's comments came as European green activists accused Australia of being a US lackey.
European Federation of Green Parties spokesman, Mr Arnold Cassola, said during a weekend conference of international greens in Canberra that both sides of Australian politics had sold out the Kyoto Protocol.
Washington refused last month to ratify the accord because of concern that the US faced strict penalties for not cutting emissions while developing nations were exempt.
The 1997 treaty for reducing greenhouse gas emissions required ratification by 55 countries producing 55 per cent of greenhouse gases, a target now unlikely since the US withdrawal.
"The problem's only going to be tackled if the international community as a whole are resolved to do so and are prepared to work together," Mr Hill said.
A plan by international green activists to boycott US oil companies in an attempt to influence America's stance on global warming has been unveiled at the weekend conference.
The boycott would be part of a strategy of using the strength of an international alliance of green movement to wage a war against corporate power, conference officials said.
