Political Exasperations Unable to bring California from the brink of Bankruptcy, Schwarzenegger calls for UN climate summit for cities
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15 December 2009
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called Tuesday for a UN climate summit for cities and other sub-national regions, offering to host it in his state.
"I would ask the UN to convene a climate summit, like Copenhagen, but for cities, for states, for provinces and for regions," he told participants at the 194-nation UN climate talks under way in the Danish capital.
"And I would be more than happy to host such a summit in California," he added, quipping that everyone likes to visit his "adopted home state."
Schwarzenegger told a packed auditorium at the conference, set to end Friday with a summit of some 120 world leaders, that nations were not the only actors in the fight against global warming.
"The world's national governments cannot make the progress that is needed on global climate change alone," he said.
"California has shown that a sub-national government can lead the way to national change, and I urge all of the world leaders here in Copenhagen to liberate the power beneath the national level to help us create an environment we can proudly pass down to our children, grandchildren and beyond."
California along with a number of US states and cities has launched a plan to curb carbon dioxide blamed for global warming, measures that the US Congress is still considering at a national level.
A day earlier, Schwarzenegger and regions of Canada, Nigeria, France and Algeria launched a coalition to fast track the results of the Copenhagen talks.
Schwarzenegger said they would push their respective national governments into more rapid actions and stronger commitments to fight climate change.
In Copenhagen, 194 nations are struggling to find common ground in hammering out a planet-saving deal to curb greenhouse gases and provide money to poor countries already suffering its ravages.
Despite two years of intense negotiations tasked with finalising an accord by the end of 2009, the conference remains blocked on most key issues.
