Al-Jazeera Reports US Emissions 'Breach Human Rights'

The "Hate America Network", Al-Jazeera has found an ally in the Great White North. It is reporting that Northern Canadians believe that carbon emissions from the US changed their climate so greatly that their human rights have been violated. Their case was made Thursday by the Inuit community before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

They have asked the 34-nation body in a petition for assistance "in obtaining relief" from the impact of climate change. The petition refers directly to the United States as the country most responsible for the climate change. This seems to be a "convenient truth/excuse" for a scathing Al-Jazeera article.

Climate change is "destroying the right [of the Inuit] to life, health property and means of subsistence. States that do not recognize these impacts and take action violate our human rights," said Sheila Watt-Cloutier, an Inuit activist. Following this logic, not embracing the current flurry of Oscar winning global warming rhetoric is now a hate crime.

The article on Al-Jazeera, quotes the activist's speculations," She said ice formations are much more likely to detach from land as temperatures rise, taking unsuspecting Inuit hunters out to sea." The US is culpable for unforeseen AND natural occurrences affecting the Inuits.

The petition comes as scientists formally kicked off the biggest polar study project in 50 years. It is utilizing researchers from 63 nations in 228 studies to monitor the health of the polar regions, using icebreakers, satellites and submarines. The project ends in March 2009.

The polar year is important because it is "pooling the resources of many countries in a coordinated effort to solve a major scientific problem of our time," Kim Holmen said by telephone.

Global warming "is the most important challenge we face in this century," Prince Albert II of Monaco said in launching the project in Paris. "The hour is no longer for skepticism. It is time to act, and act urgently." I remember Ted Danson saying something like that in the eighties...he gave the world ten years. Ian Allison, a co-chair of the International Polar Year committee and researcher gives it a bit longer. "The projections are that ice in the Arctic will disappear in the summer months. There will no longer be perennial ice ... sometime within the next century," he said.

The polar year is being sponsored by the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization and the International Council for Science. About $1.5 billion has been earmarked for the year's projects by various national exploration agencies, but most of the money comes from existing polar research budgets.

Here's a responsible thought...if Al-Jazeera wants to go after the "root cause" of the Inuit problem, it should also include the Arab countries who parleyed and politicked to supply the oil to the US which produced the carbon emissions which melted the ice which took the hunters out to sea in the first place. It's kind of like the old lady who swallowed the fly.

Then again I'm an American who carpools....