Wall Street Journal - September 5, 2002

The summit had been envisaged as a landmark opportunity to refocus the world's attention on poverty and destruction of the environment. But during the conference, the U.S. faced repeated criticism for President Bush's decision not to attend and for his administration's resistance to firm environmental targets and timetables supported by other countries. Many activists said the summit's final agreement was inadequate.

The U.S. joined 190 other nations Wednesday in adopting an action plan aimed at improving the lives of the poor and protecting the environment.

The 70-odd page document is intended to turn commitments made 10 years ago at the Rio Earth Summit into reality.

While there were a few achievements -- mainly on protecting fisheries, promoting corporate accountability and bringing sanitation to the poor -- activists charged that much of the summit was a desperate fight to stop governments from weakening existing agreements.

Mr. Powell was heckled as he defended what he called the U.S.'s "enduring commitment to sustainable development."

Much of the anger during the summit focused on Washington's opposition to the Kyoto global-warming treaty and its cooperation with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries in derailing a push by the European Union and Brazil to set a global target for producing energy from renewable sources, such as solar and wind power.

Meanwhile, other governments moved to distance themselves from the U.S.

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said that, even though no global renewable-energy target came out of the summit, the EU will move forward to come up with such a target within its own region.

In his speech, Mr. Powell sparked particularly loud boos when he accused Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe of pushing land reforms that have pushed "millions of people to the brink of starvation."

Mr. Powell drew further hisses when he criticized the decision by some African countries to reject U.S. food aid that includes genetically modified corn.

The summit's conclusion was delayed by a couple of hours as delegates negotiated the wording of a political declaration to accompany the plan.

Commitments to focus attention on issues including foreign occupation, terrorism and HIV were added at the 11th hour before the declaration was adopted with applause.

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