Transcripts For WETA Worldfocus 20091217 : vimarsana.com

tonight on worldfocus sectary of statclinton travels to copenhagen and endorses a plan to pay poor nations $1 billion to help end glal warming. is a bger deal in the work we will takeou to coal country in china, where forts to goreen are causing unemployme fears. 20 yearster romania s revolution, these won who killed their husbds have never be prosecuted meet russia s chamon kite surfer. > from the diffent rspectives around the world, thiss worldfocus. jor support has been provide by rosalind p. walter and the peter g. person foundation, dedicated promoting fiscal responsibily and addressi key economic challengesacing america s future. mutual of america. and additional funding i ovided by the following suorters good evening and welcometo worldfocus, i m daljit dhaliw. onday before the meeting ends with the summit gathering of 100 world leaders, including esident obama. the keyssue of helping deloping nations deal with global arming, secretary of state hiary clinton said tday that the united ates would join other countries in raising $100 billion for tt effort with a few big ifs attached to such a commitment. sh her announcement, the top united nions climate officials seemed more upbeat, hold tight he said, mind the do doors, the cab car is moving ain. in toght s lead focus,n indepth lo at some of the big climate issues starting withhe latest from penhagen. crunch time in copenhagen on the day bere the last day of thclimate conference, seetary of stateillary clinton tried to breathe new life io the faltering talks. the united states is pepared towork with otherountries toward a goal of joiny mobiling $100 blion a year by 2020 t address the climate change needs of developing cotries. reporte secretary clinton did notpecify the arican contrition to the fund and made the proposal contingent on a global agreement for the duction of caonmissions and other harmful greenhouse gases. she al insisted onays to verify emission reductions. china has rested u.s. verificati deman, but as the chine premiere arrid in copeagen, china s deputy foreign minier seemed to soften china s stae. he said, beijingis readyor dialogue and cooperation. that is not intruse, that does not infringe on china s soreignty. secretarclinton s proposal was the first time that the u.s. government isublicly cited long-term financing to help poorer countriesombat forestation, build seawalls and cope with unusual drought and other problems caused by climate change. the commitment tohelp developing countries and ina s acceptance of emissions verification could lead to a breaktough in copenhagen. oliver morton, who is at the imate conference does not think at a comprehensive agement will be reached by world leaders tomrow. i don t think at the moment we re veryikely to s anything like a fal finding document out of copenhan. what seed likely to come out is some sort of doment seing up a timetable whereby the proposals and outlines agreed here by heads of ate tomorrow could be turne intolegally binding document, pele are talking about maybe within six months. reporter: and secreta clinton was eqlly uncertain out a finaleal being rped in conhagen. he president is pnning to come tomorrow. obviously, we pe that there will be something to come for. reporter: we ve taled a lot about th imct of climate ange on the environment. now let s look at something that ge a lot less attentio the economic impact of cleaning up the environment. we re going to take you to the coal fields in china, and then more tha 10,000 me as w in the united states. in two stories with rallels that we have chos from our partners. first from shan-shi province, whatappened when the government shut down the cl palestines. reporter: coal country d the mining boomto of ming woo. fo years the peole have benefitted from a great urce of weth, areas so rich in coalall you have to do is strike the ear anywhere to find it. but th years areer. these n tell us they snd in the cold all day hoping find work. theye hungry, as many as % of people here are now unemployed. and this is why, hundreds of mines have been shut down b the government. ny were dangerous, bu coal is also chna s biggest source of pollutn. and the governnt now nts to clean up i act. th told us at the front gate this mine has been closed for a year, but we came around the ba and it loo like tre s stila secret, small scale opation going on it the only way for mi owners to beat the system. ross the provinc over the last ar, the government has seized , one after another, causingeconomic chaosn its wake. you reooking at t only place in cina with negative gdp owth this year. shan-shi s gdp waspposite the re of thecountry s 8% growth. everything aroun town is about coal. we have no othe industries here, everything depends o coal. that s not even farng for us toe selsufficient. rorter: it s a stark decision. do pple breathe healthy air or lose their economic means and stve. it s going to be a question china as aeveloping country will face here i this town and untless other ples like it. why should the people take on th kind of sacrifice? this is a part of t deteination and commitnt made by the national government, we have to make ithappen. this is a reall tough period that the country is gng thugh now. and i m hopi with more understanding, with re support from t internaonal communit even sympathy. t country wants to show the world itsserious about cleanin its air and tackling global climate chge. here in ming w th s little coolation for the jobss woers. that s the view from china. next, we look at how our britis partner itn covered t prospect of cutting pollution in this country atome of the coal mines ofest virginia. just ask the people there about climate change and globa warming. that s wre sah smith is, to em, copenhagen reprents a real threat. coal mini is west virginia. it s always been west vginia, soutrn west virginia is 100% iven by coal ning. americauns on coal. overalf the cntry s energy comes from burning al. s the cheape way they can make electricy. but it salso justabout the dirtie. in aces like wst virginia, coal is also theedrock of the enre economy. so here they e desperaly worried about proposed new laws that ai to control pollutiony setting limit on e cntry s total rbon ission. people arscared to death in we virginia. i am, i m 50 years old. i m o young to retire. my menhat work for me are concned about it. they talk about it every single all seethe handwritingn the wall. it willesecrate the cal miningndustry inest virginia and nationde. an we ll end u driving us into a bkrupt state reporter:big coal has huge political cout and in coal stes like west virginia, the environmentalrotest is aut is kind of stripmining. they blast 70 feet of rock off the muntain top sohey c scoop out 18 inches of coal. as long as they can gett it, there is enough coal left to last another 200 year and people who live here believe it s tir d-given righto geit. you en your living fm the grou. god put the coal in this earth to man the mines. west virnia it s coal mies. we don t have cal mines in west viinia, we don t have nothing. reporter:west virginia is already one of th poorest stes in the union. enti families like leon, h sons and grandchildn, rely on coal mining forhat few job there are. and viewed frohere, it s hard to see the worldwidecale of climate chnge. i vebeen list thing to global warmingn television. d it s just hoax. rorter: people around the world are critical americans, they say youuse too much energy here. americans shouldtry to use less oil, coal? i m doing my bes to preserve energy. i have light bus in the living room turned off, use only e light lb. i m trying to conserve ener. buwhat i m really ying to conserve is my powerbill, because, you ow, without the ney to pay for my power bi, en i m going to have it shut off. reporter: havin the biggest power plant in america rht on your doorstep doeshelp keep electricity prices wn, as wll as providing jobs. and these are the two bigst hules preventingmerica from making drastic emissio s cuts. no politician will ve for legislation that will cost people mo for their energy and cost the state jobs. st of these coal statesare representeby democrats w say they do want to fry try to tack climate cnge, butot at the expee of their voters. one of the senators is on rerd as sayinge won t vote for anything that hurts the workers, families or coal-based ecomy of west virginia. presidt obama cannot take the action on climatchange he would like to, because of widespread opposition within his own rty and republicans across america who are pretty united in their positio of p and trade laws th think will cost business. iwe force these at cod be onerous emissions standards on to our manufauring base, we re ing to be long our jobs that are nevegoing to come bac and at s part the heart and soul of america. i thi we have to be very careful ofbeforewe commit to something that s going to basically chase jobsovseas to her countriethat don t have this. or aren t willing t partipate. reporte the world nee coal to keep making che electricity, and west virginia needcoal to survive. and president obama hasn t yet persuaded amerans they ought to sacrifice their own futurer . sarah smith, channel 4 news, west virginia with those storiesou just saw in mind. we also want know what you think. tonight s question, how concernedare youabout the economic impact of tougher environmentalstandards? you can sre your opini by gog to the how you see seion of o website at worlocus.org. fiing a solution climatchange will invol a balancing act. addressing human ecomiceeds while ensuring the long te futuref the natural world. r a closer look at t impact of climate change on nare, we re joined by steve sanderson, the president andceo of the wildlife cnservation site. thank u very much for joining us on the program. is niceo be here. when talk abo the climate change debate,it s often portrayed as oneor the other, that our human needs, economiceeds trump those of nature. the two are somehow seen at odds with each other. do you thinkhat is entirely true? f you thinkof responding to climate changer moderating the waye live aeing against our interests, then yes, they can b opposed. if w want to live completely without responsibity to the earth, then we can sayhat thesare either/or. in fact,o many of our interests e joined with those of the natal wod. and we faely separad our intests from thosef the naral world. are a part of nature. and we depend on nature for our liveliod. if we look at practic questions, where do we get our water from, how can we count on ou water being clean,how do our ecostems rresh the earth. how is carbon stored and releed in the ear? these are things that a fundamental to human ife. let s talk a little bit about your organization which has draw attention to some animals that may be in jeopardy e to climate change. so people might say,hy is it important to save these particular imals. they thetip of the iceberg. flamingos are a dominant bird across north amica, latin amera, asia. they r a wonderful bird. but 84% of migratory birds in e world are at risk from clate change. the shallow lakes on whi they depend are disappearing due t clate change. all of the people in the andes ly on that same water reurce. the flamingos are kind of the canary in e coleman for the pele who depend on the slopes of the and for their wat reurces. beyond tha it s about the diversity of life on earth. if we can t own up to that, we re very poor. one of the decions out of copenhagen todayas a pledge by rich nations to give several billion dollars to help prevent the deforestation of rainforest how snificant of a developmen do you think tt is when you look at i in t natural contexof abitats, the types of animals you re talki about. it s a great advance because key yo t left i out and bali put it back in. it s a great advance, it s a w to ensure t most valuabl fo forrests and grass lan in the world arprotected. it s a big de. steve sandeon, thank you fojoining us. the wall stetournal reports shiite militts in iraq senty u.s. manned predar drones, they could evade americ military opations. shiite fighters iraq used software programs such sky grabber, available f as little as $25.95 on the inteet to regularlyapture drone video feeds. the intercepts point to a personallyserious vulnerability in washington s growin network of uanned drones whh have become the american weapon of choice in bh afghanist an pakian. officials said that the united states is now working on encrypting all drone video feeds from iraq, afghanistan and pakistan and in pakistan today inteigence officials said suspected american drone attac killed 15 people inclung 7 men believed to foreign fighters. the attac was on two compounds in the north wazirist tribal region and was said to involve five unmanned drone aircrafts that fired tenn ils. this suggted the foc may have been a high profile targe pakistan often publiy protests such rikes, it s believed to seetly aide them. yemen has be struging r years against arowing presence and influence of a qaeda. today officls sd that security forces struck several al qaedahideouts and training bases. the attacks to place near the pitol sanar and in a sthern province. at least 35 suspected militants were kild, including fou poteial suicid bombs. at lst 17 more we arrested. and from egypt today,a piece of the ancient past realed. archaeologts fted a granite lon that was part cleotra s temple complex emerged for centuries in the harb of alexandri archaeologists say it is at least 2,000 years old and likely much older. it will beart of an underwater museum, which will showcase the suen city,hich is thought to haveeen plunged into the sea by earthquakes in thfourth century. we loo beyond the headlines tonight tothe dows of mania. 20 years ago day the uprising that would lead to the end of mania s pressive counist regi began. more than 1,000 people we killed the widow and many others fou it difficult to move beyond the romania theynew under the dictor. but we meetsome of them tonight in this rert from deutsch lle. reporter: morthan 500 victims of the bloodyrevolution of 1989 are buried her elena lost her sband back then during protests, he was shot from behind 16 times. the jacket he w wearing a the time is all thatshe had left. people we on to the streets and lost their lives iorder to chge thgs. it s true that much has improved for some peopl but not for us. ere s a law calling for a surviv s pension, buto far i haven t received anything. her friends all lost their spouses as well. they are the widows of the revoluti revolution. ecember is always horrible for us. as other families prepare for christmas, we sit alone at home crying. reporte romaniaas changed significantly in the 2 years since the revolution. there are few reminders of the dark days when a dictator was in power. most have ma way for mbols of modern consumerism. poverty is a part of every d life in romia. capitalism has ft many to fend for themselves. t changes brought nothing good for me, unemployment a early retirement freedom of speech and freedom go where want in t worl reporter: for younger people thevents of december 1989 are ancien history. few real want to remember. but this man can t orget, he ent years in jail for criticizing the regime. over the last 20 year he s fought for more demracy and reconciliation. there are sll a nuer of very difficult problems. but we didn have an other option. u have to look at the progress made. there have been democratic changes such as free elections, meership in natoand the european uon. and a certn leve ofconomic development. but definitely not to the extent that we would have wanted reporter:he demands of the widows of the revolution have nobeen met. the killers of their husbands were never brought to justice. they hardly beneted from the chans in romania. you can buy anything, but we don t have anymoney. it wasn t worth the sacrifices our loved ones mde. our way c only be to keep going-forward. we have to solve our problems on our own. and still learn decracy. weave to fd our own way out of the political, soal and ecomic crisis. reporter: a tall der, escially when the pple in power then sti have important lls now, clearing up the past is not in theirnterest whatsoever, which mns the widows a unlikely to ever see their husbd s killers brought to justice. finay tonight, let s lighten this up a little wh a bit of sheer escapisme came ross today from one of r paners. here s something we di t know. a young russianan is the world ampion of kite rfing. not faliar with theupport? robert bodana show us what kit rfing and its sport are all about. reporter: kite surfing. one of the mt eye catchi and elegant sports. the 2009 world champion, the world cup winner, and quite simplyhe world s bes freestyle kite surfer. he s the first ever rsian to reach those heights in any extreme sports. nobody culd expect a russian kite surfer to perform well. they just don t believe there are any skillful onesrom russ russia. face some problems wh the judges. of cose, it always takes time to reach the top. the 22-ar-old made his internationalebut in 2005 aftebecominghampion of russ. and he hasn t lost a sing domestic event since. however, the best way to do something wellis to first enjoy doing it. kite surfing a lifestyle to me. a pleasure of a jobthat makes me happy. i m not only focused on the results of tles. rorter: after his unning achievement, theoung star is r from coming dow and resting his laurels. e next step is to share t experience with hiompetitors and ost russian attendance in kite sufing. next yar i will focu on domestic events. reporter: onene kite surfing champion already, russia haevery reason expect a new era of extremeports helpful in the very near future. tha is worldfocus f this thursday. n t forget you can find re internationanews and analysis at our website at wodfocus.org. i m dalj dhaliwal in new york. thank you for joining . we ll see you back here the same time tomoow. until then, good-bye. major suort for worldfocus has been ovided by rosalind p. walter and e peter g. peterson undation, dedicated to promoting fiscal resnsibility and dressing key economic chlenges facing america s future. mutual of america. and ditional funding is providedy the following and ditional funding is providedy the following supporters captns by vitac www.vitac.com