On June 7th 2007, the 2nd day of the G8 Summit, the Streit Council and Ctizens for Global Solutions co-sponsored a panel on:

GLOBAL WARMING: ENGAGING THE US AT THE G8 SUMMIT

with

 John Boright
The US National Academy of Sciences
International Affairs Director

Anatol Lieven
The New America Foundation
Senior Research Fellow

The National Academy of Sciences, together with the national science Academies of all the G-8 countries, sent on May 16 a message to the G-8, calling on it to take strong joint action on global warming. Angela Merkel of Germany , as head of the G-8 for 2007, has put global warming high on its agenda. She will preside at the G-8 Summit June 6-8. UN Secretary General Ban has endorsed the G-8’s taking up this subject and said he will come to the Summit. Germany (Merkel), France (Sarkozy), Britain (Blair) and Japan (Abe) are pushing for a strong common G-8 position on global warming, to lead to global negotiations on a successor to Kyoto. The U.S. is resisting; nevertheless, in preparatory joint G-8 statements it has gone along with stronger formulations on climate change than in the past.

How far can the Summit go on global warming? Can the G-8 bring the U.S. along to support more effective cooperation on this matter than has been achieved in other forums? If the U.S. causes the G-8 statement to be watered down too far, will it damage America’s best friends among the G-8 leaders – Merkel, Sarkozy, Blair, Abe – who are trying to rebuild the alliance with America? Can the G-8 and the UN system do more together in the future in organizing international cooperation against global warming? The panel addressed these and other questions on the eve of the final day of the Summit.

Above: John Boright (US National Academy of Sciences) and Tiziana Stella (Streit Council).
Below: Anatol Lieven (The New America Foundation), John Boright (US National Academy of Sciences), Ira Straus (Citizens for Global Solutions). (Photo: Riccardo Monaco)

Thursday, June 7, 2007
4:00 - 5:45 pm / Reception: 5:45 pm

Read the Transcript of the Panel Discussion

UN Information Center
1775 K Street, NW, Suite 400, Washington, DC