Fury Erupts At UN Climate Talks

COPENHAGEN : Fury erupted at the Copenhagen climate talks Saturday over a draft accord agreed by a select group of leaders, with several poor nations saying it amounted to a coup against the United Nations.

“You are going to endorse this coup d’etat against the United Nations,” Venezuela’s representative Claudia Salerno Caldera told Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen, the conference’s chairman, in a speech from the floor.

“Those of us who wish to speak have to make a point of order by cutting our hands and drawing blood,” she added, before opening a red-stained palm.

Tuvalu’s Ian Fry, whose country is one of the most at risk from global warming, said the agreement amounted to Biblical betrayal.

“It looks like we are being offered 30 pieces of silver to betray our people and our future,” he said to applause in the chamber.

“Our future is not for sale. I regret to inform you that Tuvalu cannot accept this document.”

Rasmussen, looking uneasy in his chair, faced a barrage of criticism during the highly-charged session which was convened several hours after US President Barack Obama said he had reached a political agreement with around two dozen fellow leaders, including from China and India.

Cuba accused Obama of “behaving like an emperor,” adding that the Havana government would not accept the draft declaration.

The plenary session was then suspended after Costa Rica demanded explanations for key text that had disappeared from a draft resolution while the leaders’ wrangling had unfolded.

That text said countries would strive for a “legally-binding” agreement in Mexico City at the end of 2010 — a position supported especially by Russia, Canada and Japan in order to lock the United States into a treaty.

Green delegates said they suspected the vital words had been deleted as a quid pro quo to placate the United States.

Obama flew out of Copenhagen late Friday before any decision among the 194 members of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on whether to accept the draft agreement.

The agreement contains a commitment to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit), but did not spell out the important stepping stones — global emissions targets for 2020 or 2050 — for getting there.

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Fury Erupts At UN Climate Talks was first posted on December 19, 2009 at 3:27 pm.

New Mass Grave Found Near Kirkuk: Iraq

BAGHDAD: Iraqi government says a mass grave discovered in northeast Iraq contains 185 bodies, mostly of women and children believed killed during a crackdown against Kurds by former dictator Saddam Hussein.

Majid Abdullah Karim of the Iraqi Ministry of Human Rights said Saturday that the number could be lower because only bones were found.

Karim says the grave was discovered south of Kirkuk two years ago, though forensic pathologists only began examining it this week.

The grave was found at a former military camp used by Saddam’s forces. Authorities believe the remains date to between 1988 and 1991.

An estimated 180,000 Kurds were killed by Saddam’s forces during the late 1980s in a brutal crackdown on Kurdish insurgents.

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New Mass Grave Found Near Kirkuk: Iraq was first posted on December 19, 2009 at 3:45 pm.

Four Trains Get Stuck Under English Channel

LONDON:Four trains have broken down in the Channel Tunnel due to cold weather, as snow is expected to cause further disruption in parts of Britain.
More than 2,000 people were trapped in the tunnel and some of the trains were without heating and lighting. The temperature difference between the cold air and warm tunnel caused the trains to break down, authorities said. Passengers from two of the services have been moved to different trains; the other trains are to be pushed out.
More snow and freezing temperatures are expected for parts of Scotland and south-east and eastern England. Two further trains travelling from Brussels and Paris heading for the tunnel were turned back.

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Four Trains Get Stuck Under English Channel was first posted on December 19, 2009 at 3:51 pm.

Princess Of Wales Lady Diana’s 12th Death Anniversary

LONDON: Today is the 12th anniversary of Diana’s death in a Paris car crash. Mourners lay tributes at the Pont D’Alma, the tunnel where she died, at Kensington Palace in London where she lived, and at Althorp in Northamptonshire, where she grew up and is buried.

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Princess Of Wales Lady Diana’s 12th Death Anniversary was first posted on August 31, 2009 at 11:23 am.
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