This diary is my Earth Day message and plea to President Obama to attend the Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in June. His presence would elevate the importance of the summit and possibly influence a global commitment. Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development...Anton Power
I'm not the only one asking the President to attend. Ban Ki-moon the Secretary General of the United Nations has made a personal plea to President Obama that he attend this years summit in June. Organisers had purposely scheduled Rio+20 immediately after the G20 meeting in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, hoping to lure Obama and other world leaders to attend.
The UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon made a personal appeal to Barack Obama to attend the milestone Rio+20 summit in June, saying his presence would be critical to the summit's success. [..] "I hope he will participate himself immediately after the G20 summit meeting," Ban said. "It's at most a few hours' flight."He went on to urge the audience to lobby the White House on the meeting, convened 20 years after the international community first pledged to work together on climate change and other global concerns. "Please tweet, please tweet," he said.
Personally, I think it's a long shot because President Obama's attendance would create a potential political minefield in an election year with half the US congress convinced that climate change is a hoax. But if he can't attend it would be good to have some top surrogates in his place. So I think it's crucial that we let him know that we are aware of how important this is.Unfortunately, the world has been waiting for too long for the US to commit to any global climate deal. As the world's greatest greenhouse gas polluter the US has a responsibility to help heal the damage and make the Earth a safer home.
Please sign this petition on change.org requesting that President Obama attend the Rio+20 Climate summit.
Thanks Everybody and Happy Earth Day!