Suing The Climate Criminals - global warming lawsuits planned by Friends of the Earth - Brief Article

Ecologist, The, Nov, 2000

Friends of the Earth is planning to take legal action against governments and industries that attempt to block the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol.

Following the example of the landmark lawsuits in the US that forced the tobacco industry to pay up for its wrongdoing, Friends of the Earth is looking into possible legal liabilities that may accrue to those responsible for climate change such as major fossil fuel users and the coal, oil and gas industries.

Friends of the Earth said that when it raised the subject of a climate change lawsuit, British Petroleum (BP) lawyers responded in a similar fashion to the tobacco industry when testifying to the US Congress that it believed that tobacco was not addictive. BP's lawyer's said 'that climate change hasn't been proven'.

Friends of the Earth International will undertake a two-year study determining whether or not there is a sound case to recoup damages caused by global warming. Christian Aid estimates that the total cost of climate change over the next 20 years could be [pound]6.5 trillion. Munich Re, one of the world's top insurance companies, has also been adding up the financial cost of the recent, unprecedentedly high, number of 'natural' catastrophes and is pointing at climate and environmental change as the principal reason for this alarming increase.