Iceland’s president opens sustainable development meeting

Iceland’s president Olafur Ragnur Grimsson gave the opening speech of last week’s Sustainable Development Summit in India. Citing recent findings by the Arctic Council’s Arctic Climate Impact Assessment report, Grimsson challenged those who don’t take action to limit climate change.

“Join me on a journey to the North, to the Arctic regions,” he suggested. “The evidence from the Arctic is indeed convincing and the consequences of the developments up north will affect the entire world, primarily through rising sea levels all over the globe and through dramatic changes in the conveyor belt of ocean currents which ranges from the North Atlantic to the Indian Ocean and onwards to the Pacific.”

Grimsson’s speech included a veiled jab at U.S. President George W. Bush, who has not supported the Kyoto Accord, an international agreement to cut the production of heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

“If the doubting crowd in the debate on global warming, those who criticize all warnings of climatic change, would accept my invitation to travel north they would be able to witness dramatic changes: the melting of glaciers throughout the Arctic, both in my own country and in Alaska, the state which again strongly voted George W. Bush into office…”

The Sustainable Development Summit continued until Feb 5, and featured speakers from the United Nations and presentations from environmental ministers. For more information, consult www.teriin.org/dsds/2005/.