Tuesday, May 04, 2004

UN official declares Skeptical Environmentalist world's next Hitler



"The chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, has likened environmental pundit Bjørn Lomborg's view of humanity to that of Adolf Hitler. Pachauri, who spoke with daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten's JP Explorer in New Delhi, India last week, took issue with Lomborg's position that it would be too costly for the international community to take steps to save endangered cultures, such as the Arctic Inuits, from the effects of global warming.

"'What is the difference between Lomborg's view of humanity and Hitler's? You cannot treat people like cattle. You must respect the diversity of cultures on Earth,' said Pachauri.

"'Lomborg thinks of people like numbers. He thinks it would be cheaper just to evacuate people from the Maldives, rather than trying to prevent world sea levels from rising so that island groups like the Maldives or Tuvalu just disappear into the sea. But where's the respect for people in that? People have a right to live and die in the place where their forefathers have lived and died,' Pachauri continued."