Industrialised States Accused of Endangering Summit lisbon, feb 13 1992 (ips) -- unless there is a change in the attitude of industrialised countries, the environmental conference in rio de janeiro, next june could be a complete failure, says former portuguese secretary of state for the environment, carlos pimenta. pimenta on thursday accused the industrialised nations of a ''lack of vision, egotism, and electoral motivations'' -- attitudes which he says are preventing the adoption of resolutions aimed at saving the environment. pimenta, now a deputy from the governing social democratic party in the european parliament, has his doubts that the united nations conference on environment and development (unced) would solve the environmental problems. ''a spectacular failure is preferable to a bad agreement designed to accommodate the various egotisms and interests, particularly economic, of the rich countries,'' pimenta believes. the rio conference would only be a success, he said, if the industrialised states ''do not compromise'' because of their big egos, ''this unique opportunity to unite political leaders from the entire world to work out a joint strategy to save their common heritage -- the planet earth''. noting that the problems of the environment were intimately linked to the distribution of wealth between north and south, pimenta deplored that ''the rich countries are still unable to understand that we are facing the greatest threat which has ever existed to the security of the planet''. the world ecological system has already been profoundly altered, he said, adding: ''but this is still reversible.'' he expressed concern about the changing course of ocean currents, the rise in sea levels and the proliferation of hurricanes and typhoons. pimenta said the people who will be affected most as a consequence of the increase in natural disasters will be the least developed countries. the wealthier nations, he said, would no doubt develop a technology which would allow them to minimise the effects of impending natural disasters. ''confronted with a rise in the sea level the dutch have already prepared studies for increasing the height of their dykes, while bangladesh, for example, or the mauritius islands will simply disappear from the map,'' pimenta concluded. source: en.unced.general, pegasus electronic conference.  |
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