Posted on 08/28/2002 7:50:55 AM PDT by Starmaker
The environmentalists have already scored a major victory at Earth Summit II. A United Nations agency that helped Enron develop Communist China´s energy resources is getting almost $3 billion more from the U.S. and other countries.
In advance of the World Summit on Sustainable Development, being held August 26-September 4 in South Africa, the United Nations announced on August 17 that a fresh $2.9 billion will be funneled into its Global Environment Facility (GEF). The U.S. is listed by the GEF as one of 32 donor countries to the "replenishment" of the GEF. The head of the GEF says he eventually wants global taxes.
The GEF funneled $10 million over a more than six year period (May 1991-December 1997) through the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in the area of "climate change" to help develop China´s coal resources. The bankrupt energy company Enron was a major participant in this scheme. Typically, Enron invested in such projects and then bought and marketed the power. A UNDP fact sheet describes the project and the involvement of the Chinese regime and Enron's involvement.
China, which produces the most coal in the world, got the money so it could explore ways to reduce air pollution caused by the use of coal and recover methane and use it as a fuel. Enron also participated in a 1995 U.N. International Symposium on Coal Bed Methane Development and Utilization in Beijing.
Enron supported the U.N.´s climate change treaty and its Kyoto Protocol, also known as the global warming treaty. The "green" company gave an award to former Soviet Communist Mikhail Gorbachev, who has become a leading proponent of the global warming treaty and an "Earth Charter."
China is a major beneficiary of GEF largesse. GEF records show two-dozen environmental and energy projects currently being financed in China at a cost of more than $352 million. In June the GEF awarded a "Global Environment Leadership Award" to Xie Zhenhua, China´s Minister of Environmental Protection.
The little-known GEF is headed by Mohamed T. El-Ashry, who gave a speech on March 18, 2002, at the U.N. Financing for Development Conference calling for "more resources" and the "mobilization of additional finance" to save the environment and assure "human survival."
El-Ashry told a conference in Denmark last year that an international carbon or energy tax "is often suggested as a means of generating revenues for global environment and sustainable development purposes." He added, "There are also ideas related to taxing international air transportation, international tourism, and even a surcharge on automobile registration."
He said a global tax on currency transactions could generate $100-300 billion a year "and the revenue could go to earmarked trust funds for urgent international priorities related to sustainable development and the global environment." However, he conceded that taxes "are not a popular subject with politicians."
Summit secretary-general Nitin Desai calls the additional money for the GEF a major success but says he wants more, too. GEF was established in 1992 with $2 billion and gained an additional $2 billion in 1998. The fund underwrites alternative energy and other projects in 160 countries and is the financial mechanism for the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Published reports show that Enron chairman Ken Lay, a member of President Clinton´s Council on Sustainable Development, had a meeting with Clinton and Vice President Gore on August 4, 1997, and that he advocated compliance with the Kyoto Protocol as "good for Enron stock" because it benefited their business interests. Enron had also invested in solar and wind power boondoggles.
Columnist Robert Novak wrote on January 17, 2002, that Lay was close to former Senator Timothy Wirth, an environmentalist who is now president of Ted Turner's billion-dollar United Nations Foundation. The U.N. Foundation and Enron jointly funded a project through the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe for an Energy Efficiency Investment Project to facilitate economic development in the former Soviet Union.
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