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CZECH REPUBLIC: 'Environmentalism As Bad As Communism'
By Zoltán Dujisin
BUDAPEST, Mar 29 (IPS) - Czech President Vaclav Klaus has offered fresh
warnings that environmentalism and
measures to curb climate change are a threat to human freedom.
The President's most recent and controversial statements came when
replying to questions
sent to him by members of the U.S. House of Representatives energy and
commerce
committee which had requested his views on climate change.
Klaus is known for calling climate change "a false myth" or a "nonsensical
fiction", and he
opposes the Kyoto Protocol on limiting greenhouse gas emissions.
Vaclav Klaus was one of the leading political figures of post-communist
Czechoslovakia
and was prime minister of the Czech Republic between 1993 and 1997,
leading the newly
independent country in its economic transformation. The old Czechoslovakia
split into the
Czech Republic and Slovakia Jan. 1, 1993.
An enthusiastic supporter of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan's
policies, Klaus was
founder of the Civic Democrats (ODS), a neo-liberal party now in
government.
The U.S. congressmen were asking how humans contribute to climate change
and how
these changes should be dealt with in legislation.
Another high-ranking figure whose views were heard was former U.S.
vice-president Al
Gore, one of the leading voices calling for changes in human behaviour to
avert an
environmental catastrophe.
Conversely, the Czech President asked the congressmen not to yield to
pressure from
environmentalists and abandon the principles of free society: "the biggest
threat to
freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity at the beginning of
the 21st
century is not communism or its various softer variants. Communism was
replaced by the
threat of ambitious environmentalism."
"This ideology," Klaus said, "wants to replace the free and spontaneous
evolution of
mankind by a sort of central, now global, planning of the whole world."
The Czech President is strongly opposed to environmentalism, which he
calls a "religion
based on political ambitions rather than science," and accuses
environmentalists of using
"sophisticated methods of media manipulation" to spread "fear and panic".
Klaus also reminded environmentalists, in a text charged with economic
jargon, that
"policymakers should protect taxpayers' money and avoid wasting it on
doubtful projects,"
and that each measure "must be based on a cost-benefit analysis."
Klaus fears environmentalist policies could set "artificial limits" and
have "devastating"
effects on national economies, harming growth rates and "the
competitiveness of firms on
international markets."
In the opinion of the Czech President, climate change is an unavoidable
and natural
consequence of "exogenous and endogenous natural processes," and that "no
government
action can stop the world and nature from changing."
While most Czechs are by now familiar with Klaus's radical pro-market
views, he managed
to surprise many when claiming that "while some deserts may get larger and
some ocean
shores flooded, enormous parts of the earth" could become "fertile areas
able to
accommodate millions of people."
Vojtech Kotecky from Friends of the Earth replied by asking Klaus whether
he thought
"people from flooded Bangladesh or dried up Africa should move to Siberia
only to allow
obsolete industrial forms to continue emitting pollutants."
Environment minister and chairman of the Green Party Martin Bursik said
that the
President had ridiculed himself and the country.
"The congressmen gave Klaus the opportunity to express his favourite
clichés and ideas,"
Jan Drahokoupil, analyst at the Czech Economy and Society Trust told IPS.
"He has been active trying to prove climate change is a myth, organising
conferences and
even helping fund translations of books supporting this view. He draws
resources and
funding from like-minded American foundations," Drahokoupil said.
The President's text was criticised for being simply ideological and
lacking any evidence,
examples or statistics, but several scientists and other Czech
personalities were especially
enraged by Klaus's comparison of environmentalism to communism.
"He relies on the anti-communist card because anti-communist sentiments
are very strong
in the Czech Republic," Drahokoupil told IPS. "It's a very powerful tool
in politics and media
to compare something to communism; Klaus uses it against anything he
doesn't like."
Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, a member of Klaus's ODS, initially refused
to comment on
the President's views, but later said he had the right to his opinion and
that some of his
ideas were close to him.
But Topolanek has had to accommodate some environmentalist views as he was
forced to
include the Greens in the cabinet he formed last January. In spite of
their belonging to the
same party, Klaus was unhappy about Topolanek's choice of coalition
partners and did not
make an effort to conceal his criticism.
Many in the ODS are unhappy with the Green Party pushing through its
energy policies,
which ODS first deputy chairman Pavel Bem considers as being "way off
mark". Bem also
warned that disputes within the governing coalition were likely to
escalate.
Nonetheless, the Prime Minister, who considers climate change "a big
business," called on
the right to start acting before "the Socialists" take the initiative and
"start allocating very
valuable public resources in a wrong way."
On Mar. 9 Topolanek agreed with other EU member states to curb climate
change by
partially harmonising the organisation's energy policy with the goal of
reaching a one-fifth
share of renewable energy production by 2020.
The Czech Republic, presently not ranking among the most
renewables-friendly EU states,
was part of the small group of countries that found the goal to be
unrealistic. A
compromise was eventually found allowing member states to reach different
shares. (END/2007)
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