Albright's Earth Day Diplomacy

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright yesterday released the State Department's first annual "Environmental Diplomacy" report, "a gloomy catalogue of problems in the world's air, oceans and forests" that she said threatens American security. Competition for scarce resources can escalate tensions "or cause ruinous violence" among countries, Albright said in a briefing.

The report, to be issued annually on Earth Day, stems from a Clinton administration initiative to boost environmental issues on the national security agenda. Vice President Al Gore wrote in the report that foreign policy must consider "damage to the world's environment that transcends countries and continents," such as "global climate change, ozone depletion, air pollution and resource degradation" (Thomas Lippman, Wash. Post, 4/23).

Consistent with the "new 'green' slant to its foreign policy" (Reuters/N.Y. Times, 4/23), the State Department will open "environmental hubs" in 12 countries during the next two years to foster regional cooperation on water supplies, deforestation and biodiversity. The first hubs will open this year in Costa Rica, Uzbekistan, Ethiopia, Nepal, Jordan and Thailand.

And at international talks on climate change in December, Albright said that the U.S. will push for a treaty to ban 12 toxic chemicals and legally binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions (Lippman, Wash. Post).