Void in World Water Leadership Cited as 20 Former Heads of Government Conclude Meeting

kristyEarth Systems Science

InterAction Council
www.interactioncouncil.org

Void in World Water Leadership Cited as 20 Former Heads of Government Conclude Meeting

Clinton, Fox, Zedillo, Chretien, Fukuda, Brundtland among 20 former leaders urging greater effort to avert looming water crisis

Quebec City — Former heads of government from around the world today agreed at a meeting in Canada to establish a new panel to help fill a serious void in leadership related to global water issues.

Saying that “international water leadership is virtually nonexistent,” the retired leaders say the panel will work to elevate the issue’s political prominence in an effort to avert a looming “water crisis.”

The 20 members of the InterAction Council attending this year’s three-day annual meeting in Quebec City included former US President Bill Clinton, former Mexican Presidents Vicente Fox and Ernesto Zedillo, and former prime ministers Yasuo Fukuda (Japan) and Gro Brundtland (Norway). Co-chairing the meeting: former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien and former Austrian Chancellor Franz Vranitzky,

At the meeting’s conclusion, the group urged a new international water ethic and offered today’s political office-holders some 21 recommendations for world water management moving forward.

The top recommendation: “placing water at the forefront of the global political agenda.”

Others include: link climate change research and adaptation programs to water issues, make the right to water legally enforceable, raise the price of water to reflect its economic value while making provisions for people in poverty, prefer the growth of food over biofuel crops in places where water supplies are threatened, and encourage the UN Security Council to take up water as an important focus.

They welcomed both a high level of dialogue and cooperation on water-allocation in the Mekong River delta between China and India and the work done by the Clinton/Bush Haiti Fund, which aims to rebuild housing in Haiti with adequate sanitation to avoid public health disasters through water contamination.

In addition to the water crisis, the Council touched on other environmental topics, warning of the “intensification of natural phenomenon caused by climate change as demonstrated by floods, hurricanes, earthquakes and tornadoes ravaging the globe.”

On other topics, the Council expressed deep condolences to the Japanese people who endured the recent earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis.

They warned of potentially “prolonged instability” in North Africa and the Middle East and of inflationary dangers caused by escalating government debt loads.

And they called on governments to eliminate nuclear weapons of mass destruction, the theme of the Council’s 2010 meeting in Hiroshima, Japan, saying “the continuing existence of nuclear weapons is an unacceptable and disproportionate threat to every living thing on the planet. The only enduring solution to this threat lies in the verifiable and irreversible elimination of these weapons.”

“As long as nuclear weapons exist in the hands of any state, they will be sought also by others. As long as nuclear weapons exist they will be used one day, either by deliberate action or by accident. Any use of nuclear weapons would be a human, ecological, economic, political and moral catastrophe. States continue to seek nuclear weapons for a number of reasons. The question of proliferation needs to be recognized and addressed.”

The full text of the 2011 statement is appended.

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InterAction Council

Established in 1983, the 37-member InterAction Council seeks to address long-term, global issues — identifying future challenges and recommending feasible solutions.

InterAction Council members at the meeting in Quebec City

The Rt. Hon. Jean Chrétien, Co-Chairman (former Prime Minister), Canada

H.E. Dr. Franz Vranitzky, Co-Chairman (former Chancellor), Austria

H.E. Mr. Helmut Schmidt, Honorary Chairman (former Chancellor), Germany

H.E. Dr. Oscar Arias (former President), Costa Rica

H.E. Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (former Prime Minister), Malaysia

The Rt. Hon. Mr. James Bolger (former Prime Minister), New Zealand

H.E. Dr. Gro Brundtland (former Prime Minister), Norway

H.E. Mr. William Jefferson Clinton (former President), United States of America

H.E. Mr. Fernando de la Rúa (former President), Argentina

H.E. Mr. Vicente Fox (former President), Mexico

H.E. Mr. Yasuo Fukuda (former Prime Minister), Japan

H.E. Mr. Goh Chok Tong (former Prime Minister), Republic of Singapore

H.E. Dr. Abdel Salam Majali (former Prime Minister), Jordan

The Rt. Hon. Sir James Fitz-Allen Mitchell (former Prime Minister), Saint Vincent

and the Grenadines

H.E. Mr. Andrés Pastrana (former President), Colombia

The Rt. Hon. Percival Noel James Patterson (former Prime Minister), the

Republic of Jamaica

Sheikh Abdul-Aziz Al-Quraishi (former Governor of Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority), Saudi Arabia

The Rt. Hon. Mr. Tung Chee Hwa (former Chief Executive), Hong Kong

Administration

H.E. Dr. Vaira Vike-Freiberga (former President), Latvia

H.E. Dr. Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Léon (former President), Mexico

Associate Members

Dr. Thomas Axworthy, President and CEO, Walter & Duncan Gordon Foundation,

Canada, and Secretary-General of the InterAction Council

Baroness Margaret Jay, United Kingdom

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Special guests

Dr. Abdulrahman H. Al-Saeed, Advisor, The Royal Court, President of Center for Specialized Studies, Saudi Arabia

Mr. Abdullah Al Hussayen, Minister of Electricity and Water, Saudi Arabia

H.E. Amb. Richard Butler, Chairman, Middle Power Initiative, Australia

Mr. Mike Hightower, Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratories, USA

Mr. Bob Sandford, EPCOR Chair of the Canadian Partnership Initiative in support of the United Nations Water for Life Decade, Canada

Mr. Tang Jiaxuan, Former State Councillor, People’s Republic of China

Mr. William F. Weld, Former Governor of Massachusetts, USA

Full text of the IAC statement follows:

29th Annual Plenary Session

29-31 May 2011

Québec City, Canada

Humankind is faced with the danger of a water crisis. Without water, energy cannot be produced, crops cannot grow, sanitization is compromised, and human health is put in jeopardy. Clean and reliable access to water is integral to maintaining and supporting a life full of dignity.

Reflecting the interdependence of the world and the importance of multilateral solutions, the InterAction Council assembled for its 29th Annual Plenary Session in Québec, Canada in May 2011 to focus on the global water crisis and address present challenges of the world: the unrest in the Middle East and nuclear disarmament.

With regard to the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster in Fukushima, the Council expressed its deep condolences to the Japanese people, the victims of the disaster, and their families.

The Council expressed its gratitude to the resigning Secretary-General Mr Isamu Miyazaki and welcomed its incoming Secretary General, Dr Thomas Axworthy.

Present State of the World

North Africa and the Middle East are undergoing great change. The enthusiasm of crowds calling for democracy and human rights is a demonstration that the desire for freedom is universal. At the same time, these dramatic changes bring the possibility of prolonged instability in their wake. While military interventions can prevent massacres and provide short-term order, they are no substitute for the hard, long, local learning necessary for democracy’s roots to take hold. The leaders and peoples of the Middle East must prepare now their pathways to reform.

How the new regimes of the Middle East will affect the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is yet to be seen, but what is certain is that the region will remain unstable until there is a peaceful settlement of this conflict. Recent efforts by US President Barack Obama to reinvigorate the peace negotiations and his calls to stop the expansion of Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories are welcome steps. They need continued support.

The world’s economy remains in severe disarray, even if it is slowly recovering from the financial meltdown. The present situation has been brought on by excessive risk-taking by financial institutions, greed, and inadequate regulation of the financial markets. While a coordinated approach by the G20 has prevented a depression, the financial crisis is not yet over. The previous accumulation of fiscal debt, effect of the recession on fiscal revenue and the stimulus measures have created escalating debt, which will lead to inflation and a reduced capacity of states to respond to evolving crises.

Inflation disproportionately causes hardships for the poor and the vulnerable. The lives of the one billion people already struggling to survive on less than a dollar a day become even more difficult as commodity and oil prices continue to increase.

Recent events have reminded us of the devastating force of natural disasters and their immediate effects on mankind. No continent is immune to the effects of intensification of natural phenomena caused by climate change as demonstrated by floods, hurricanes, earthquakes and tornadoes ravaging the globe.

The experience of Japan raises dramatically the issue of the risks and rewards related to energy production. Many countries have turned towards nuclear power as a means to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to meet the challenges of climate change. However, there are potential safety issues with nuclear energy. Japan’s experience highlights the necessity of moving towards renewable energy and developing a model of sustainability.

Furthermore, in dealing with climate change, reducing black carbon and methane gas from farm waste and urban landfills should be priorities.

Responsible solutions to global issues should be anchored in mutual understanding of global ethics. What is required in the global architecture is a document which outlines core principles of moral responsibility, a code of ethics which places a premium on truth, respect for every individual, and concern for the security and well being of all. In this regard, the InterAction Council reaffirmed its commitment to the Universal Declaration on Human Responsibilities and considered pathways for its advancement.

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