Berlin - Germany expects tough negotiations with the United
States on climate protection at the G8 summit to be held in the
northern town of Heiligendamm in early June, a government spokesman
said in Berlin Tuesday.
Talks ahead of the summit had not produced satisfactory results
thus far, said Bernd Pfaffenbach, a secretary of state in the
Economics Ministry tasked with preparing the June 6-8 meeting.
Chancellor Angela Merkel aimed to make climate change a central
theme at the summit, being held under the German G8 presidency,
Pfaffenbach reiterated.
He indicated government disappointment that the US was not yet
prepared to submit to an internationally agreed climate protection
regime along the lines of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which runs out in
2012.
Pfaffenbach expressed optimism that criticism by non-governmental
organizations, which have voiced strident protest at past G8 summits,
would be muted this time.
Merkel intended to meet NGO representatives in mid-May, and the
NGOs had welcomed the fact that the chancellor intended to place
Africa high on the agenda, he said.
G8 members aimed to offer African countries a 'broad political
partnership' with the aim of promoting democracy and reducing
corruption, Pfaffenbach said.
He stressed that money was not the solution to everything,
although the industrialized countries stood by their longstanding
commitments, including allocating 0.7 per cent of gross domestic
product to development aid by 2012.
African countries needed to improve their governmental structures
and to attract more private capital, he said.
Algeria, Egypt, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa have been
invited to the conference, as have Brazil, China, India and Mexico.
Anti-globalization organizations are predicting that up to 100,000
demonstrators will march in the nearby city of Rostock, while police
estimate the number at half that.
Larger organizations, like Attac and Greenpeace, have committed
themselves to peaceful marches, while smaller, more radical, groups
have refused to rule out violent protests like that in Genua in 2001.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur 
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