Report: Global warming to hit poor

NEW YORK, March 31 (UPI) -- A new report by a United Nations committee finds that rich countries are spending billions of dollars to protect themselves from global warming.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change plans to release the report next week, The New York Times said. The committee found that the United States and European countries are investing in desalinization plants, flood barriers and other infrastructure.

Poor countries in Africa and Asia that have comparatively less responsibility for greenhouse gas emissions are likely to bear the brunt of rising temperatures, the panel found. Climate change is expected to make drought more common in Africa, while crowded river deltas in South Asia and Egypt and small island countries will be the first to feel the effects of rising sea levels.

"We have a message here to tell these countries, that you are causing aggression to us by causing global warming," President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda warned richer countries when he addressed the African Union summit in February. "Alaska will probably become good for agriculture, Siberia will probably become good for agriculture, but where does that leave Africa?"