Charles Haviland, BBC News 9 Nov 09;
The president of the Maldives has strongly criticised the world's rich countries for doing too little to stem climate change.
Mohamed Nasheed said there was so little money offered to vulnerable nations that it was like arriving at an earthquake with a dustpan and brush.
He was opening a high-level two-day gathering of countries deemed especially at risk from global warming.
The Maldives government says the islands face disaster if oceans rise.
This was an outspoken attack on the G8 rich countries by the leader of a country so low that rising sea levels threaten to submerge most or all of it by 2100. The Maldives stands about 2.1 metres (7ft) above sea level.
President Nasheed said the wealthy nations had pledged to halt temperature rises to 2C, but had refused to commit to the carbon targets that would deliver this.
Glaciers melting
Even with a 2C rise, he added, "we would lose the coral reefs… melt Greenland, and… my country would be on death row".
"I cannot accept this," he said.
The Maldives wants the countries at this gathering to follow its own example in aiming to go carbon neutral, switching to renewable energy and offsetting aviation pollution.
Such a bloc of developing countries could change the outcome of next month's climate change summit in Denmark, the president said, making it morally harder for rich countries not to take action themselves.
The Maldives is hosting about 10 nations vulnerable in different ways - African countries threatened by desertification, mountain ones whose glaciers are melting, large Asian ones affected by floods and typhoons, and other small islands like itself.
Maldives urges small states to go 'carbon neutral'
AFP Yahoo News 9 Nov 09;
MALE (AFP) – The Maldives, which is one of the nations most vulnerable to rising sea levels, on Monday asked fellow endangered states to go carbon neutral and lead a drive to reduce global warming.
Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed opened a two-day conference here on climate change urging smaller countries, which are faced with the prospect of being wiped out, to adopt environmentally-friendly energy.
"A group of vulnerable, developing countries committed to carbon neutral development would send a loud message to the outside world," Nasheed said, adding that they needed to make a commitment to carbon neutrality.
Nasheed, 52, called the meeting of 11 of the world's least polluting smaller states, including Kiribati and Barbados, in a bid to hammer out a common stance ahead of the United Nations climate summit in Copenhagen in December.
"If those with the least (pollution) start doing the most, what excuse can the rich have for continuing inaction?" he asked. "We know this is not an easy step to take, and that there might be dangers along the way.
"We want to shine a light, not loudly demand that others go first into the dark."
Last week, the Maldives flagged off construction of a 200-million-dollar wind farm as part of efforts to make the low-lying archipelago carbon neutral by 2020.
The wind turbine facility on a small islet just north of the capital Male is expected to be completed within 20 months, an official said, adding that it would supply more than half the nation's electricity needs.
Nasheed, whose cabinet met underwater last month in a stunt aimed at highlighting the Maldives' vulnerability to rising sea levels, said he wanted the country to be a showcase for renewable and clean energy.
Being carbon neutral normally means reducing emissions of greenhouse gases where possible and offsetting or compensating for any others that cannot be eliminated.
In 2007, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that an increase in sea levels of just 18 to 59 centimetres (seven to 24 inches) would make the Maldives virtually uninhabitable by 2100.
More than 80 percent of the tiny nation, famed as a tourist paradise because of its secluded beaches, coral reefs and white-sand beaches, is less than a metre (about three feet) above sea level.
Copenhagen failure would be 'suicide': Maldives
Yahoo News 9 Nov 09;
MALE (AFP) – The president of the Maldives has warned that a failure to agree a deal on limiting greenhouse gas emissions in Copenhagen next month would be an act of "collective suicide".
"At the moment every country arrives at climate negotiations seeking to keep their own emissions as high as possible," President Mohamed Nasheed said here. "This is the logic of the madhouse, a recipe for collective suicide.
"We don't want a global suicide pact. We want a global survival pact."
More than 190 nations are to meet for UN talks in Copenhagen from December 7-18, aiming for a post-2012 accord to slash emissions from fossil fuels that trap solar heat and drive global warming.
But after nearly two years of haggling, deep rifts remain over apportioning emissions curbs between rich economies and fast-growing developing nations and on the accord's architecture and legal status.
Nasheed opened a two-day forum for 11 countries considered the most vulnerable to climate change, urging them to go carbon neutral to show the rich world the way forward.
"A group of vulnerable, developing countries committed to carbon neutral development would send a loud message to the outside world," Nasheed said, adding that they needed to make a commitment to carbon neutrality.
Nasheed, 52, called the meeting of the world's least polluting smaller states, including Kiribati and Barbados, in a bid to hammer out a common stance ahead of the Copenhagen summit.
"If those with the least (pollution) start doing the most, what excuse can the rich have for continuing inaction?" he asked. "We know this is not an easy step to take, and that there might be dangers along the way.
"We want to shine a light, not loudly demand that others go first into the dark."
Being carbon neutral normally means reducing emissions of greenhouse gases where possible and offsetting or compensating for any others that cannot be eliminated.
Some 85 delegates were taking part in the conference at the Bandos island resort, a short boat ride from Male, the capital of the archipelago which is best known for its upmarket tourism.
Last week, the Maldives flagged off construction of a 200-million-dollar wind farm as part of efforts to make the low-lying archipelago carbon neutral by 2020.
The facility on a small islet just north of the capital Male is expected to be completed within 20 months, an official said, adding that it would supply more than half the nation's electricity needs.
Nasheed, whose cabinet met underwater last month in a stunt aimed at highlighting the Maldives' vulnerability to rising sea levels, said he wanted the country to be a showcase for renewable and clean energy.
In 2007, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that an increase in sea levels of just 18 to 59 centimetres (seven to 24 inches) would make the Maldives virtually uninhabitable by 2100.
More than 80 percent of the tiny nation, famed as a tourist paradise because of its secluded beaches, coral reefs and white-sand beaches, is less than a metre (about three feet) above sea level.
China, Britain, Denmark, France, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Russia and the United States sent observers for the conference, called the Climate Vulnerable Forum, officials said.
Threatened Maldives urges joint action at climate talks
Maryam Omidi, Reuters 9 Nov 09;
MALE (Reuters) - The Maldives, threatened by rising sea levels because of global warming, on Monday pleaded with developed nations to reduce carbon emissions and said developing nations could change the outcome at climate talks in Copenhagen.
The appeal by the Indian ocean archipelago came at a climate change summit grouping Bangladesh, Nepal, Vietnam, Kiribati, Barbados, Bhutan, Ghana, Rwanda, Kenya and Tanzania before next month's global climate change summit in Copenhagen.
Despite being among the world's lowest emitters of greenhouse gases, the countries share the worst impacts of climate change including desertification, drought, floods and storm surges.
"We are vulnerable because we have modest means with which to protect ourselves from the coming disaster," Maldivian President Mohammed Nasheed told the conference.
Nasheed, who in March outlined ambitious plans to make the world's first carbon-neutral nation within a decade, said developing nations could change the outcome of Copenhagen, blaming developed nations for the global warming.
"They never make commitments, unless someone else does first. This is the logic of the madhouse, a recipe for collective suicide. We don't want a global suicide pact. And we will not sign a global suicide pact, in Copenhagen or anywhere.
"I think a bloc of carbon-neutral, developing nations could change the outcome of Copenhagen. At the moment every country arrives at the negotiations seeking to keep their own emissions as high as possible."
The summit comes three days after hopes of a legally binding treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol were dashed during talks in Barcelona.
Nasheed last week said Maldives could achieve its aim of becoming carbon neutral well before its 2020 target, the Indian Ocean island nation's president said on Monday.
(Writing by Ranga Sirilal; Editing by Nick Macfie)
