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| A new world leader emerges? |
paraclete |
12/05/07 |
While the Us has abdicated any leadership position on climate change it seems new leadership is emerging in unlikely places
I can unite the world on climate, says Rudd
Cynthia Banham Foreign Affairs Reporter
December 5, 2007
Garrett as support act: minister sidelined on global warming
AUSTRALIA will take on a highly ambitious and activist role on the international stage under the new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, who has unveiled a grand plan for uniting the world on climate change.
Heralding a significant shift in foreign policy from the Howard era, Mr Rudd - former diplomat and China expert - told the Herald yesterday he intended to use Australia's new position as a member of the Kyoto club to "bridge the gap" between developed and developing countries on future emissions controls.
In his first newspaper interview as Prime Minister, Mr Rudd admitted it was an enormous challenge but said Australia had a "national and international responsibility to the next generation" to do everything it could to counter the threat of climate change.
Mr Rudd will travel to Bali on Tuesday to join the UN conference on climate change, in what will be his first appearance on the world stage as Prime Minister.
While there, he revealed, he will also seek to enhance Australia's relationship with Indonesia when he meets its President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
The Climate Change Minister, Penny Wong, will play the key role as "principal negotiator" in Mr Rudd's vision for Australia as the world's new climate change broker, further underscoring her rapid rise in the new government.
"I fully recognise the difficulty of this because the distance between those two positions at present is enormous, but this is a gap which Australia in the past could not even hope to begin to bridge because we were not at the negotiating table at all in a substantive way," Mr Rudd said.
"We now are, and Senator Wong's brief, apart from arguing the Australian position, will be to do whatever is within her power and Australia's power to seek to bridge the gap between the positions of the developed and developing world on future emissions controls."
Having freshly ratified the Kyoto Protocol, Mr Rudd will personally hand Australia's instrument of ratification to the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon.
He will also meet the president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, and the former US vice-president, Al Gore. In his talks with Dr Yudhoyono, Mr Rudd said he would cover the "entire spectrum" of Australia's relationship with Indonesia, including the adequacy of security co-operation.
Terrorism would feature in these talks. As opposition leader, Mr Rudd nominated the rise of militant Islam as one of the biggest issues facing the world.
"My view is this is a relationship which our two governments can enhance, both at a level of security co-operation and economic engagement, as well as people-to-people contacts," Mr Rudd said.
"On the security policy engagement what I'd like to do with President Yudhoyono is quickly review the adequacy of our existing levels of security co-operation in the security, policing and intelligence areas, with a view to identifying any gaps which we can fill in the future in our common fight against terrorism."
After the Howard government's emphasis on the importance of bilateral relationships - especially with the US - Mr Rudd's grand plans for Australia in brokering a new global understanding on climate change signal a return to multilateralism and middle-power diplomacy as key features of the country's foreign policy.
It is significant that within days of assuming the prime ministership, Mr Rudd - who spent most of the first eight years of his parliamentary career as opposition spokesman on foreign affairs - has seized on climate change to showcase his new vision for Australia's role in international affairs.
He said he would use the opportunity in Bali to underline why Australia has altered its policy on climate change.
The former prime minister, John Howard, refused to ratify the protocol, along with the US.
"The reason for Australia changing its policy is our belief that the planet is now under increasingly significant threat and that therefore the requirement for global co-operation now is not optional, it is urgent," Mr Rudd said. He recognised the huge challenge he had set Senator Wong, and there was no guarantee of success.
"But I think we seize the fact that we have national and international responsibilities here to the next generation and that means using every ounce of Australia's national diplomatic energy to try and bridge that gap."
On the domestic front, Mr Rudd said it was still his Government's policy that there needed to be commitments from both developed and developing countries into the future on reducing emissions targets - despite his Environment Minister, Peter Garrett, contradicting this during the election campaign.
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