US warns EU on using climate change as pretext for protectionism - by James Kanter and Stephen Castle
The United States warned the European Union yesterday against using climate change as a pretext for protectionism, setting the stage for trans-Atlantic tension over a new package of EU measures to combat global warming.The pointed comments by the US trade representative, Susan Schwab, after talks in Brussels, came just two days before the European Commission introduced its proposals for cutting EU emissions at least 20 percent from 1990 levels by 2020.
"We have been dismayed at a variety of suggestions where we have seen the climate and the environment being used as an excuse to close markets," Schwab said after discussions with Peter Mandelson, her European counterpart. EU officials hope that other developed countries like the United States, which did not sign the Kyoto climate treaty, will join an international treaty by the end of the decade, making protectionist measures unnecessary.
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