Gya: Putin bows to junk science join the WTO

The Russian position was curiously similar to that of the US at least until recently. At a climate change conference a year ago, Mr Putin declared that he was convinced that Kyoto would harm his goal of doubting Russia's Gross Domestic Product (G.D.P.) in 10 years :. The leading Russian expert Andrei Illarianov contended as late as April this year that the Kyoto Protocol would be an 'Auschwitz' for Russian economic development. In similar vein, the prestigious Russian Academy of Sciences advised the Kremlin that the Treaty would have spurious benefits for Russian environment and economy.

So how come Mr Putin's sudden somersault - namely his decision to ratify the treaty. As responsible for 17% of greenhouse gases, Russia's participation will be sufficient to bring the Kyoto treaty into operation as the 55% will have been reached.

His decision is a remarkable example of the interlinkage of issues and the balancing of power among major states which so often leaves small states (although not this time) out in the cold. Mr Putin is now anxious for Russia to be admitted to the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The European Union which attaches high importance to the ratification of Kyoto has been raising strong objections to Russia's entry into the WTO. So a deal has been done. The EU has lowered its objectives to Russia's entry in WTO provided Russia ratifies Kyoto. As the pro-Putin bloc controls a two-thirds majority in the Russian Parliament there will be no difficulty in securing ratification.

Yet the ratification of Kyoto must be seen for what it is, the beginning of a slow process to save planet earth from hazardous levels of global warming with its menace to human communities.

What is significant about this piece is its unreflective acceptance of the junk science pronouncements of the Euros and other "scientists" who buy into the environmentalist wacko global warming nonsense.

To date nobody has debunked the research findings of "Danish professor and prominent former Greenpeace member Bjorn Lomborg [who] has done such damage to the radical environmentalist movement with the publication of his scathing book, The Skeptical Environmentalist." There is no such animal as global warming. Get over this junk! Would that the environuts and their willing accomplices in the media would get over their god-comples!

Is it too much to expect that Caribbean journalists will learn to think for themselves instead of blindly following after their equally unreflective peers in the Euro and American press?