[NYTr] Inuit: US Emissions "Breach Human Rights" Date: Fri, 2 Mar 2007 19:07:36 -0600 (CST) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit See also: Warming Destroys Our Way of Life: Inuits Denounce US (RHC, Feb 10, 2007) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20070205/058821.html Global Warming: US Worst Culprit (WW, Jan 15, 2007) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20070115/056550.html Inconvenient Truths (for Al Gore and the Rest of the Planet) (Ind Sep 17 2006) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20060911/046102.html What Planet Are You On, Mr. Bush? (Ind, Dec 4, 2005) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20051128/027759.html The Inuit Nation Demands the Right to Exist (ind, Dec 16, 2004) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20041213/010522.html sent by Bill Koehnlein Al Jazeera - March 1, 2007 http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D6C6C6A7-A253-46AF-B284-A2B9B0E96A28.htm US Emissions "Breach Human Rights" Northern Canadians believe that carbon emissions from the US have contributed so much to climate change symptoms that their human rights have been violated. The case was made Thursday by the Inuit community before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. In their petition, the Inuit community asked the 34-nation body's assistance "in obtaining relief" from the impact of climate change. The petition specifically refers to the United States as the country most responsible for climate change. Sheila Watt-Cloutier, an Inuit activist, said climate change is "destroying the right [of the Inuit] to life, health property and means of subsistence". "States that do not recognise these impacts and take action violate our human rights," she said. She said ice formations are much more likely to detach from land as temperatures rise, taking unsuspecting Inuit hunters out to sea. The presentation of the Inuit petition comes as more than 60 nations launch the broadest scientific investigation yet of the Arctic and Antarctic to chart polar regions. About 50,000 people will be involved in 228 monitoring projects, such as studying marine life in the Antarctic, mapping how winds carry pollutants to the Arctic or examining the health of people, polar bears and penguins. Overlooked Many scientists say that warming of the Arctic, where indigenous hunting cultures and animals are under threat from receding ice, may be a portent of damaging shifts elsewhere on the planet linked to climate change. Continued melting of ice sheets on Greenland or Antarctica in the next few decades risks raising world sea levels, threatening cities from Tokyo to New York and low-lying coral atolls in the Pacific. "These regions are highly vulnerable to rising temperatures," Michel Jarraud, head of the UN's World Meteorological Organisation, said in a statement. He said more monitoring stations were needed in polar regions. Rising temperatures Arctic temperatures are rising fast partly because water or ground, once exposed, soak up far more heat from the sun than ice or snow. Antarctica is staying cooler, with its far bigger volume of ice acting as a deep freeze. The world's top climate scientists said in a UN report last month that "average Arctic temperatures increased at almost twice the global average rate in the past 100 years". They projected that sea levels could rise by 18 to 59cm by 2100, by when Arctic sea ice may disappear in summers. Nordic nations with Arctic territories fear industries such as tourism are vulnerable to climate change. Source: Agencies * ================================================================ .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org .List Archives: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ .Subscribe: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================