BERLIN, May 30 (UPI) -- The pressure is rising on Group of Eight summit host German Chancellor Angela Merkel not to bow to the United States when it comes to climate change.
A day after Merkel met with U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who assured Merkel the support of her fellow lawmakers for ambitious measures to combat global warming, the German Green Party urged the chancellor not to bow before Washington.
"At the G8 summit, Merkel must not capitulate before U.S. President (George W.) Bush when it comes to climate protection," Renate Kuenast, head of the Green Party's parliamentary faction, told Wednesday's Berliner Zeitung newspaper. "If Bush wants to play the climate killer, then there has to be a final G8 declaration without the United States."
After her Tuesday meeting with Merkel in Berlin, Pelosi stressed her commitment to "global and sustainable solutions" and multilateral agreements to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius.
Merkel's government has drafted a declaration on climate change that would set concrete energy efficiency targets and greenhouse gas caps. The United States as well as India and China -- two states invited to join the G8 summit -- are against such targets.
Merkel and Bush so far have fostered close ties, with the June 6-8 summit having the potential to cool down relations between the two leaders, observers say.
