President Obama will announce as early as Tuesday that he will combine that state’s emissions rules with the existing corporate average fuel economy standard overseen by the Transportation Department, the officials said. As a result, cars and light trucks sold in the United States will be roughly 30 percent cleaner and more fuel-efficient by 2016.
The White House would not divulge details, but environmental advocates and industry officials briefed on the program said that the president would grant California’s longstanding request to implement its tailpipe standards. Thirteen other states and the District of Columbia have said they intend to apply the same rules. That request had been denied by the Bush administration but has been under review by top Obama administration officials since January.
Yet Mr. Obama is planning to go further, effectively issuing a single rule for both fuel economy and emissions that matches California’s strictest-in-the-nation standard.
Under the new standard, the new combined fuel efficiency standard for cars and light trucks will be about 35 miles per gallon by 2016, roughly in line with the California rule.
“This is a very big deal,” said Daniel Becker of the Safe Climate Campaign, a group that has pushed for tougher mileage and emissions standards with the goal of curbing the heat-trapping gases that have been linked to global warming. “This is the single biggest step the American government has ever taken to cut greenhouse-gas emissions.”
Industry officials spoke on condition of anonymity about the program because they said they did not want to comment publicly in advance of the White House announcement.
The current standards are 27.5 miles a gallon for cars and about 24 miles a gallon for trucks. The new mileage and emissions rules will gradually tighten, beginning with 2011 models, until they reach the 2016 standards.
The auto industry is not expected to challenge the rule, which provides two things they have long asked for: certainty on a timetable and a single national standard.
The administration has faced a June 30 deadline set by Congress to decide whether to grant California’s application to impose new emissions rules. President Obama became personally involved in the issue because he is also trying to find a way to rescue the American automobile companies from their financial crisis.
One top industry official said the administration wanted to get the new mileage rules in place before General Motors makes a decision on a bankruptcy filing, which could happen by the end of the month.
The new rules also provide some certainty for Chrysler, which is already under bankruptcy protection, so that it can plan its future models.
Mr. Obama directed the Environmental Protection Agency in January to reconsider the Bush administration’s past rejection of the California application. The president also instructed the Transportation Department to draw up rules to supplement a 2007 law requiring a 40 percent improvement in gas mileage for autos and light trucks by 2020.
The Bush administration failed to write any regulations to enforce the 2007 law.
Daniel J. Weiss, an environmental policy analyst at the liberal Center for American Progress, said that under the White House plan, California would retain the ability to set its own emissions standards in the future when the current program expires.
He also said that the new administration program was very close in language and intent to a provision in the climate change and energy bill now before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. That bill calls for a "harmonization" of the California and federal regulatory programs to provide a nationwide standard.
He said the standards were being written so that the car companies would already be on track to meet the standards set in the first few years of the program. The cars and trucks that will be sold in that period are already in the design phase. But starting in 2013 and 2014, the new rules will begin to bite, Mr. Weiss said.
"The rubber really meets the road in 2014," he said.
Mr. Obama has been thinking about the future of the American automobile industry for years. In 2006, during his second year as a United States senator, he co-sponsored a bill to raise fuel economy standards and another to encourage the use of alternative fuels.
During the presidential campaign, he gave a speech in Detroit chastising the American automobile industry for doing too little to reduce the nation’s dependence on foreign oil and to improve the vehicles’ fuel efficiency.
"The auto industry’s refusal to act for so long has left it mired in a predicament for which there is no easy way out," Mr. Obama said.
That inaction was one factor that brought General Motors and Chrysler to their current dire state, requiring billions in federal bailouts and Chrysler’s forced marriage to Fiat to survive.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Judges uphold British soldiers' human rights – even in battle
British soldiers must be protected by European human rights laws wherever they are deployed, even in battle, the appeal court ruled yesterday in a judgment described by the government as having "very serious implications" for military operations.
Three senior judges unanimously rejected claims by the Ministry of Defence that a British soldier could be protected by the Human Rights Act only when he is on a military base. "In our judgment it makes no sense to hold that he is not so protected when in an ambulance or in a truck or in the street or in the desert," they said.
"Soldiers serve abroad as a result of, and pursuant to, the exercise of UK jurisdiction over them. Thus the legality of their presence and of their actions depends on their being subject to UK jurisdiction and complying with UK law."
The ruling means that sending soldiers on patrol or into battle with clearly defective or inadequate equipment could breach their human rights.
The court case followed a legal challenge to the MoD's refusal to hand over information at the inquest of Private Jason Smith, a TA soldier who died of heatstroke in Basra on 13 August 2003. He told medical staff four days previously that he was feeling seriously unwell in the 50C heat.
Smith's mother, Catherine, said: "I am absolutely delighted and relieved by the result. This victory is not for me, nothing can bring Jason back, but it is for all those brave men and women who are still risking their lives in our name. It is also for families who still have to go through the trauma of an inquest."
Jocelyn Cockburn, her solicitor, said: "The implications of this judgment are simple – our armed forces now have the same protections as all the rest of us. The MoD suggestion that they should lose these protections when on the battlefield is outrageous. Soldiers have the right to know, when risking their lives for us, that we have provided them with all reasonable protection."
The MoD could now face a series of compensation claims. Inquests have heard that soldiers have died as a result of faulty equipment or lack of body armour.
Sir Anthony Clarke, Master of the Rolls, said the MoD had been given leave to appeal to the law lords because of the importance of the case.
However, John Wadham, the legal director of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said: "This case is not about compensation but about transparency." He added: "Of course we recognise that the armed forces are operating in dangerous situations. We can't protect their life at all costs in a combat situation, but we can do our best to ensure they remain as safe as possible".
Bob Ainsworth, the armed forces minister, said the MoD was "surprised and disappointed" by the judgment. "It potentially has serious implications for the ability of our forces – and those of our allies – to conduct military operations overseas."
An MoD spokesman said: "In the heat of battle during dynamic and fast-moving military operations on foreign territory, the UK could not secure the rights and freedoms which the Human Rights Act seeks to guarantee."
However, the judges referred to "reasonable steps" that could be taken to protect soldiers. They also said a new inquest into Smith's death should consider whether there had been "systemic failures" in the army.
Shami Chakrabarti, director of civil liberties campaign group Liberty, said: "This is a wonderful landmark decision that will defend Britain's bravest men and women for years to come. Some would like to caricature human rights as shielding only criminals but the court of appeal has made clear that they belong to everyone."
This case, and other recent ones where judges have attacked MoD secrecy, will force it to be more open, especially in future inquests, analysts said.
Past criticism has already led the MoD to improve medical care and welfare provision for soldiers, as well as getting them better equipment.
Nick Harvey, Liberal Democrat defence spokesman, said later: "The government has been trading on the can-do attitude of British soldiers for far too long. Ministers are happy to waste billions of pounds on huge procurement projects, but they pinch pennies when it comes to providing the vital equipment that our troops on the front line depend upon."
Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary, said: "To apply the Human Rights Act in a warzone flies in the face of common sense. Our troops and commanders have enough to worry about on the battlefield without worrying about where the next legal attack will come from."
Three senior judges unanimously rejected claims by the Ministry of Defence that a British soldier could be protected by the Human Rights Act only when he is on a military base. "In our judgment it makes no sense to hold that he is not so protected when in an ambulance or in a truck or in the street or in the desert," they said.
"Soldiers serve abroad as a result of, and pursuant to, the exercise of UK jurisdiction over them. Thus the legality of their presence and of their actions depends on their being subject to UK jurisdiction and complying with UK law."
The ruling means that sending soldiers on patrol or into battle with clearly defective or inadequate equipment could breach their human rights.
The court case followed a legal challenge to the MoD's refusal to hand over information at the inquest of Private Jason Smith, a TA soldier who died of heatstroke in Basra on 13 August 2003. He told medical staff four days previously that he was feeling seriously unwell in the 50C heat.
Smith's mother, Catherine, said: "I am absolutely delighted and relieved by the result. This victory is not for me, nothing can bring Jason back, but it is for all those brave men and women who are still risking their lives in our name. It is also for families who still have to go through the trauma of an inquest."
Jocelyn Cockburn, her solicitor, said: "The implications of this judgment are simple – our armed forces now have the same protections as all the rest of us. The MoD suggestion that they should lose these protections when on the battlefield is outrageous. Soldiers have the right to know, when risking their lives for us, that we have provided them with all reasonable protection."
The MoD could now face a series of compensation claims. Inquests have heard that soldiers have died as a result of faulty equipment or lack of body armour.
Sir Anthony Clarke, Master of the Rolls, said the MoD had been given leave to appeal to the law lords because of the importance of the case.
However, John Wadham, the legal director of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said: "This case is not about compensation but about transparency." He added: "Of course we recognise that the armed forces are operating in dangerous situations. We can't protect their life at all costs in a combat situation, but we can do our best to ensure they remain as safe as possible".
Bob Ainsworth, the armed forces minister, said the MoD was "surprised and disappointed" by the judgment. "It potentially has serious implications for the ability of our forces – and those of our allies – to conduct military operations overseas."
An MoD spokesman said: "In the heat of battle during dynamic and fast-moving military operations on foreign territory, the UK could not secure the rights and freedoms which the Human Rights Act seeks to guarantee."
However, the judges referred to "reasonable steps" that could be taken to protect soldiers. They also said a new inquest into Smith's death should consider whether there had been "systemic failures" in the army.
Shami Chakrabarti, director of civil liberties campaign group Liberty, said: "This is a wonderful landmark decision that will defend Britain's bravest men and women for years to come. Some would like to caricature human rights as shielding only criminals but the court of appeal has made clear that they belong to everyone."
This case, and other recent ones where judges have attacked MoD secrecy, will force it to be more open, especially in future inquests, analysts said.
Past criticism has already led the MoD to improve medical care and welfare provision for soldiers, as well as getting them better equipment.
Nick Harvey, Liberal Democrat defence spokesman, said later: "The government has been trading on the can-do attitude of British soldiers for far too long. Ministers are happy to waste billions of pounds on huge procurement projects, but they pinch pennies when it comes to providing the vital equipment that our troops on the front line depend upon."
Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary, said: "To apply the Human Rights Act in a warzone flies in the face of common sense. Our troops and commanders have enough to worry about on the battlefield without worrying about where the next legal attack will come from."
Three social workers suspended after teenager's sex attacks on young children
Three members of staff have been suspended after a series of errors gave a disturbed teenager the opportunity to sexually abuse two young children in a family he had been placed with, according to an inquiry report published today.
Social workers and managers concentrated on the 19-year-old's own problems rather than on the risks he posed to the family he was sent to live with, the inquiry found. The team that dealt with the teenager had been naive in not passing on details of the young man's background to the family.
The 19-year-old was jailed indefinitely in February after he admitted the rape and sexual assault of the children. He had been sent to live with the family by Vale of Glamorgan's adult placement service despite a history of sexual behaviour involving children.
The inquiry, carried out by the local authority and overseen by children's charity the NSPCC, found serious mistakes were made.
The report said: "Sadly, in this case there is a strong possibility that the significant harm inflicted on the children … would have been avoided if some staff in social services had worked to the high standards of practice required of them."
When social services had been responsible for the 19-year-old as a child, the risks he posed to others were recognised, shared and managed appropriately. Problems arose when he became an adult and staff were helping him find accommodation. A risk assessment was not carried out despite the written instruction of a senior manager.
"Seen for the most part as a victim in many aspects of his life, he was considered to be the one in need of protection," the report said. "Because of this focus, much of the relevant information was not made available to the parents of the children and to some of the staff involved in making decisions about providing accommodation."
The director of social services at Vale of Glamorgan council, Philip Evans, said he had considered his position but felt the easy option was to resign. The responsible action was to make sure recommendations in the report were implemented.
He said: "We have suspended three members of staff – social workers and managers – and further disciplinary action will follow quickly now we have the inquiry report. Potentially, the consequences to the staff are serious."
After sentencing earlier this year, Cardiff crown court heard that allegations about the teenager's sexual behaviour were first made in 2004, when it was claimed he acted in a sexually inappropriate way to a boy.
In 2005 he was said to have sexually touched a boy while both lived at a hostel in England. Last year he allegedly sexually assaulted a 16-year-old while they were in the same hostel. Despite this he was sent to live with the couple and their children.
The Conservative leader of the council, Gordon Kemp, said: "This is an extremely bleak day for the council. It's an extremely tragic situation, particularly so for the children involved and for their parents. We all want to offer them our sincere apologies for what's happened."
The council's chief executive, John Maitland Evans, was concerned that social services staff did not contact police when the first allegations were made against the 19-year-old. He said: "The parents were left with responsibility for contacting the police. Failure to act by these staff is almost beyond understanding. It's especially sad for us that we let down a family who opened their home to vulnerable people."
Evans said the family were still involved with adult placement provision.
Gwenda Thomas, the deputy minister for social services at the Welsh assembly, expressed her "deep concern" at the case.
Social workers and managers concentrated on the 19-year-old's own problems rather than on the risks he posed to the family he was sent to live with, the inquiry found. The team that dealt with the teenager had been naive in not passing on details of the young man's background to the family.
The 19-year-old was jailed indefinitely in February after he admitted the rape and sexual assault of the children. He had been sent to live with the family by Vale of Glamorgan's adult placement service despite a history of sexual behaviour involving children.
The inquiry, carried out by the local authority and overseen by children's charity the NSPCC, found serious mistakes were made.
The report said: "Sadly, in this case there is a strong possibility that the significant harm inflicted on the children … would have been avoided if some staff in social services had worked to the high standards of practice required of them."
When social services had been responsible for the 19-year-old as a child, the risks he posed to others were recognised, shared and managed appropriately. Problems arose when he became an adult and staff were helping him find accommodation. A risk assessment was not carried out despite the written instruction of a senior manager.
"Seen for the most part as a victim in many aspects of his life, he was considered to be the one in need of protection," the report said. "Because of this focus, much of the relevant information was not made available to the parents of the children and to some of the staff involved in making decisions about providing accommodation."
The director of social services at Vale of Glamorgan council, Philip Evans, said he had considered his position but felt the easy option was to resign. The responsible action was to make sure recommendations in the report were implemented.
He said: "We have suspended three members of staff – social workers and managers – and further disciplinary action will follow quickly now we have the inquiry report. Potentially, the consequences to the staff are serious."
After sentencing earlier this year, Cardiff crown court heard that allegations about the teenager's sexual behaviour were first made in 2004, when it was claimed he acted in a sexually inappropriate way to a boy.
In 2005 he was said to have sexually touched a boy while both lived at a hostel in England. Last year he allegedly sexually assaulted a 16-year-old while they were in the same hostel. Despite this he was sent to live with the couple and their children.
The Conservative leader of the council, Gordon Kemp, said: "This is an extremely bleak day for the council. It's an extremely tragic situation, particularly so for the children involved and for their parents. We all want to offer them our sincere apologies for what's happened."
The council's chief executive, John Maitland Evans, was concerned that social services staff did not contact police when the first allegations were made against the 19-year-old. He said: "The parents were left with responsibility for contacting the police. Failure to act by these staff is almost beyond understanding. It's especially sad for us that we let down a family who opened their home to vulnerable people."
Evans said the family were still involved with adult placement provision.
Gwenda Thomas, the deputy minister for social services at the Welsh assembly, expressed her "deep concern" at the case.
Swat valley could be worst refugee crisis since Rwanda, UN warns
The human exodus from the war-torn Swat valley in northern Pakistan is turning into the world's most dramatic displacement crisis since the Rwandan genocide of 1994, the UN refugee agency warned.
Almost 1.5 million people have registered for assistance since fighting erupted three weeks ago, the UNHCR said, bringing the total number of war displaced in North West Frontier province to more than 2 million, not including 300,000 the provincial government believes have not registered. "It's been a long time since there has been a displacement this big," the UNHCR's spokesman Ron Redmond said in Geneva, trying to recall the last time so many people had been uprooted so quickly. "It could go back to Rwanda."
The army reported fierce clashes across Swat, a tourist haven turned Taliban stronghold. After a week of intense aerial bombardment with fighter jets and helicopter gunships the army has launched a ground offensive to drive out the militants to rout the militants from the valley. Commandos pushed through the remote Piochar valley, seizing a training centre and killing a dozen Taliban, a military spokesman, Major General Athar Abbas, said. Gun battles erupted in several villages surrounding Mingora, Swat's main town. Abbas said the military had killed 27 militants, including three commanders, and lost three members of the security forces. The figures could not be verified, as Swat has been largely cut off since the operation started.
The Taliban leader in Swat, Maulana Fazlullah, remains at large. His spokesman vowed the rebels would fight until their "last breath".
The operation continues to enjoy broad public support. Opposition parties endorsed the action at a conference called by the government, dispelling the notion that the army was fighting "America's war".
But that fragile unity could be threatened by heavy civilian casualties or a further deterioration in the conditions of the 2 million displaced. Returning from a three-day trip to Pakistan, the UNHCR head António Guterres termed the displacement crisis as "one of the most dramatic of recent times". Relief workers were "struggling to keep up with the size and speed of the displacement," a statement said.
The main difference with African refugee crises such as Rwanda, however, is that a minority of people are being housed in tented camps. According to the UN just 130,000 people are being accommodated in the sprawling, hot camps in Mardan and Swabi districts, while most are squeezed into the homes of friends or relatives, with as many as 85 people in one house.
Nevertheless aid workers and political analysts warn that if international aid to ease the crisis is not urgently delivered, the strain on the displaced and those helping them could lead to political destablisation. Acknowledging the scale of the crisis, the prime minister of Pakistan, Yousaf Raza Gilani, said: "The displaced men, women and children should not feel alone. We won't leave any stone unturned in providing them help and protection."
The UN is expected to launch an international appeal for aid running into hundreds of millions of dollars in the coming days.
Almost 1.5 million people have registered for assistance since fighting erupted three weeks ago, the UNHCR said, bringing the total number of war displaced in North West Frontier province to more than 2 million, not including 300,000 the provincial government believes have not registered. "It's been a long time since there has been a displacement this big," the UNHCR's spokesman Ron Redmond said in Geneva, trying to recall the last time so many people had been uprooted so quickly. "It could go back to Rwanda."
The army reported fierce clashes across Swat, a tourist haven turned Taliban stronghold. After a week of intense aerial bombardment with fighter jets and helicopter gunships the army has launched a ground offensive to drive out the militants to rout the militants from the valley. Commandos pushed through the remote Piochar valley, seizing a training centre and killing a dozen Taliban, a military spokesman, Major General Athar Abbas, said. Gun battles erupted in several villages surrounding Mingora, Swat's main town. Abbas said the military had killed 27 militants, including three commanders, and lost three members of the security forces. The figures could not be verified, as Swat has been largely cut off since the operation started.
The Taliban leader in Swat, Maulana Fazlullah, remains at large. His spokesman vowed the rebels would fight until their "last breath".
The operation continues to enjoy broad public support. Opposition parties endorsed the action at a conference called by the government, dispelling the notion that the army was fighting "America's war".
But that fragile unity could be threatened by heavy civilian casualties or a further deterioration in the conditions of the 2 million displaced. Returning from a three-day trip to Pakistan, the UNHCR head António Guterres termed the displacement crisis as "one of the most dramatic of recent times". Relief workers were "struggling to keep up with the size and speed of the displacement," a statement said.
The main difference with African refugee crises such as Rwanda, however, is that a minority of people are being housed in tented camps. According to the UN just 130,000 people are being accommodated in the sprawling, hot camps in Mardan and Swabi districts, while most are squeezed into the homes of friends or relatives, with as many as 85 people in one house.
Nevertheless aid workers and political analysts warn that if international aid to ease the crisis is not urgently delivered, the strain on the displaced and those helping them could lead to political destablisation. Acknowledging the scale of the crisis, the prime minister of Pakistan, Yousaf Raza Gilani, said: "The displaced men, women and children should not feel alone. We won't leave any stone unturned in providing them help and protection."
The UN is expected to launch an international appeal for aid running into hundreds of millions of dollars in the coming days.
China and US held secret talks on climate change deal
A high-powered group of senior Republicans and Democrats led two missions to China in the final months of the Bush administration for secret backchannel negotiations aimed at securing a deal on joint US-Chinese action on climate change, the Guardian has learned.
The initiative, involving John Holdren, now the White House science adviser, and others who went on to positions in Barack Obama's administration, produced a draft agreement in March, barely two months after the Democrat assumed the presidency.
The memorandum of understanding was not signed, but those involved in opening up the channel of communications believe it could provide the foundation for a US-Chinese accord to battle climate change, which could be reached as early as this autumn.
"My sense is that we are now working towards something in the fall," said Bill Chandler, director of the energy and climate programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the driving force behind the talks. "It will be serious. It will be substantive, and it will happen."
The secret missions suggest that advisers to Obama came to power firmly focused on getting a US-China understanding in the run-up to the crucial UN meeting in Copenhagen this December, which is aimed at sealing a global deal to slash greenhouse gas emissions. In her first policy address the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, said she wanted to recast the broad US-China relationship around the central issue of climate change. She also stopped in Beijing on her first foreign tour.
The dialogue also challenges the conventional wisdom that George Bush's decision to pull America out of the Kyoto climate change treaty had led to paralysis in the administration on global warming, and that China was unwilling to contemplate emissions cuts at a time of rapid economic growth.
"There are these two countries that the world blames for doing nothing, and they have a better story to tell," said Terry Tamminen, who took part in the talks and is an environmental adviser to the governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. The nations are the top two polluters on Earth.
The first communications, in the autumn of 2007, were initiated by the Chinese. Xie Zhenhua, the vice-chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, the country's central economic planning body, made the first move by expressing interest in a co-operative effort on carbon capture and storage and other technologies with the US.
The first face-to-face meeting, held over two days at a luxury hotel at the Great Wall of China in July 2008, got off to a tentative start with Xie falling back on China's stated policy positions. "It was sort of like pushing a tape recorder," said Chandler, "[but after a short while] he just cut it off and said we need to get beyond this."
The two sides began discussing ways to break through the impasse, including the possibility that China would agree to voluntary – but verifiable – reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. China has rejected the possibility of cuts as it sees that as a risk to its continued economic growth, deemed essential to lift millions out of poverty and advance national status.
Taiya Smith, an adviser on China to Bush's treasury secretary, Hank Paulson, who was at the first of the two sessions, said: "The thing that came out of it that was priceless was the recognition on both sides that what China was doing to [reduce] the effects of climate change were not very well known," she said. "After these discussions was a real public campaign by the Chinese government to try to make people aware of what they were doing. We started to see the Chinese take a different tone which was that 'we are active and engaged in trying to solve the problem'."
During the second trip to China by the Americans, Xie suggested a memorandum of understanding between the two countries on joint action on climate change.
Chandler said he and Holdren drew up a three-point memo which envisaged:
•Using existing technologies to produce a 20% cut in carbon emissions by 2010.
• Co-operating on new technology including carbon capture and storage and fuel efficiency for cars.
• The US and China signing up to a global climate change deal in Copenhagen.
"We sent it to Xie and he said he agreed," said Chandler.
The ties were further cemented when Gao Guangsheng, the leading climate official, attended Schwarzenegger's global meeting on climate in November last year. Obama, who had been elected president two weeks earlier, addressed the gathering by video.
By the time Xie visited the US in March, the state department's new climate change envoy, Todd Stern, and his deputy, Jonathan Pershing, were also involved in the dialogue. But the trip by Xie did not produce the hoped-for agreement. Both Stern and Holdren declined to comment when asked by the Guardian.
Those involved agree it was premature to expect the Obama administration to enter into a formal agreement so soon in its tenure. Additional members of the US team included Terry Tamminen; Jim Green, adviser to Joe Biden, now the vice-president who then headed the Senate foreign relations committee; Mark Helmke, adviser to Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican on the committee; and Frank Loy, a former state department negotiator on climate. Both Green and Loy have been nominated to jobs in the Obama administration.
Chandler and Smith believe the effort will pay off in a more comprehensive deal between the two governments. "Xie came to visit the US when the administration was still trying to figure out its standing on climate issues and it was without very much staff," said Smith. "I don't see this as a dead issue at all. I think it's something you would consider still in process."
The initiative, involving John Holdren, now the White House science adviser, and others who went on to positions in Barack Obama's administration, produced a draft agreement in March, barely two months after the Democrat assumed the presidency.
The memorandum of understanding was not signed, but those involved in opening up the channel of communications believe it could provide the foundation for a US-Chinese accord to battle climate change, which could be reached as early as this autumn.
"My sense is that we are now working towards something in the fall," said Bill Chandler, director of the energy and climate programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the driving force behind the talks. "It will be serious. It will be substantive, and it will happen."
The secret missions suggest that advisers to Obama came to power firmly focused on getting a US-China understanding in the run-up to the crucial UN meeting in Copenhagen this December, which is aimed at sealing a global deal to slash greenhouse gas emissions. In her first policy address the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, said she wanted to recast the broad US-China relationship around the central issue of climate change. She also stopped in Beijing on her first foreign tour.
The dialogue also challenges the conventional wisdom that George Bush's decision to pull America out of the Kyoto climate change treaty had led to paralysis in the administration on global warming, and that China was unwilling to contemplate emissions cuts at a time of rapid economic growth.
"There are these two countries that the world blames for doing nothing, and they have a better story to tell," said Terry Tamminen, who took part in the talks and is an environmental adviser to the governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. The nations are the top two polluters on Earth.
The first communications, in the autumn of 2007, were initiated by the Chinese. Xie Zhenhua, the vice-chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, the country's central economic planning body, made the first move by expressing interest in a co-operative effort on carbon capture and storage and other technologies with the US.
The first face-to-face meeting, held over two days at a luxury hotel at the Great Wall of China in July 2008, got off to a tentative start with Xie falling back on China's stated policy positions. "It was sort of like pushing a tape recorder," said Chandler, "[but after a short while] he just cut it off and said we need to get beyond this."
The two sides began discussing ways to break through the impasse, including the possibility that China would agree to voluntary – but verifiable – reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. China has rejected the possibility of cuts as it sees that as a risk to its continued economic growth, deemed essential to lift millions out of poverty and advance national status.
Taiya Smith, an adviser on China to Bush's treasury secretary, Hank Paulson, who was at the first of the two sessions, said: "The thing that came out of it that was priceless was the recognition on both sides that what China was doing to [reduce] the effects of climate change were not very well known," she said. "After these discussions was a real public campaign by the Chinese government to try to make people aware of what they were doing. We started to see the Chinese take a different tone which was that 'we are active and engaged in trying to solve the problem'."
During the second trip to China by the Americans, Xie suggested a memorandum of understanding between the two countries on joint action on climate change.
Chandler said he and Holdren drew up a three-point memo which envisaged:
•Using existing technologies to produce a 20% cut in carbon emissions by 2010.
• Co-operating on new technology including carbon capture and storage and fuel efficiency for cars.
• The US and China signing up to a global climate change deal in Copenhagen.
"We sent it to Xie and he said he agreed," said Chandler.
The ties were further cemented when Gao Guangsheng, the leading climate official, attended Schwarzenegger's global meeting on climate in November last year. Obama, who had been elected president two weeks earlier, addressed the gathering by video.
By the time Xie visited the US in March, the state department's new climate change envoy, Todd Stern, and his deputy, Jonathan Pershing, were also involved in the dialogue. But the trip by Xie did not produce the hoped-for agreement. Both Stern and Holdren declined to comment when asked by the Guardian.
Those involved agree it was premature to expect the Obama administration to enter into a formal agreement so soon in its tenure. Additional members of the US team included Terry Tamminen; Jim Green, adviser to Joe Biden, now the vice-president who then headed the Senate foreign relations committee; Mark Helmke, adviser to Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican on the committee; and Frank Loy, a former state department negotiator on climate. Both Green and Loy have been nominated to jobs in the Obama administration.
Chandler and Smith believe the effort will pay off in a more comprehensive deal between the two governments. "Xie came to visit the US when the administration was still trying to figure out its standing on climate issues and it was without very much staff," said Smith. "I don't see this as a dead issue at all. I think it's something you would consider still in process."
Peace hopes grip Sri Lankans
The national flags are out. They are decking the streets, sold in clusters on street corners, fluttering from the auto rickshaws, waved by men in a pick-up truck.
On the streets of Colombo there is jubilation and smiling faces as the firecrackers are lit.
"I'm very very happy. After 30 years we've won… victory, I suppose!" says a young woman in Pettah, an old market area near the city centre, almost in surprise.
She says she is proud of the president and intends to go home and put out flags.
Not only Sinhalese but also Tamil, Muslim and other people tell the BBC they are relieved.
For decades they had feared boarding buses or visiting temples, some said, for fear of bombs. Now they hope there will be peace.
'Pride'
There is patriotic satisfaction, too, in website postings by Sri Lankans.
Sri Lanka Rockz," says one.
Some take pride in the military. "Every time we all are with you, our great warriors... One nation - One flag - Sri Lanka."
The army says its operations are ended, that rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran is dead and troops now hold all of the island's territory for the first time since 1983.
Such news will have been greeted almost with disbelief by Sri Lankans, many of whom were born into war or barely remember the time before it.
"We're part of history!" says another posting. "Today is the first day of my life I'm living in a Sri Lanka where there is no war."
A taxi driver expresses the view that, with the top Tamil Tiger leaders out of the picture, bomb blasts really will become a thing of the past.
But will they?
End of the road
Some commentators have predicted that, after their military defeat, the Tigers will concentrate more on their hallmark bombing tactics - saying this will be made possible by the cells they maintain.
But one expert tells the BBC he does not accept that argument.
Maybe there will be stray cases, he says, but with so many of the top LTTE [Tamil Tigers] leaders reportedly killed by the army, he does not see what Tamils would want to kill themselves for.
After all, according to Prabhakaran's biographer MR Narayan Swamy, for the Tigers he was "their brain… their heart… their god… their soul".
Indeed, asked whether they would continue the guerrilla war, the LTTE's foreign-based international relations head, S Padmanathan, told Britain's Channel 4 television on Sunday he believed in a peaceful solution for the Tamil people.
The war started by the LTTE has left humanitarian suffering on a huge scale - including in its final stages.
Dealing with the suffering of the refugees, the wounded and the bereaved will loom high on Sri Lanka's agenda in the immediate future.
Almost a month ago, the United Nations said it feared 6,500 civilians had been killed and twice the number wounded in the war zone since January - civilians who, it alleged, were forcibly held there by the LTTE (although the rebels always denied that) and were caught in heavy crossfire.
It described more recent violence in the small rebel-controlled zone in the north-east of the country as a "bloodbath".
Doctors working in the area described hundreds of deaths and injuries at their makeshift clinics, having to abandon the facilities in the last days.
The government said it doubted their information, as they might have been speaking under LTTE pressure - but the UN trusted them as an impartial source.
Even on Monday the UN refugee agency's head in Sri Lanka, Amin Awad, said he was worried civilians might have been killed within the past 48 hours.
Ongoing grievances
Hundreds of thousands of traumatised, emaciated people have poured out of the combat zone in the past few weeks and now stay in difficult conditions in government-run camps.
The UN and humanitarian agencies will be hoping for better access to them now that the war is over.
The UN has also said it is concerned about the welfare of the doctors who are believed to have escaped the fighting but have not been heard from since.
The government says political reforms will also be on its agenda, reforms that will perhaps aim to tackle some of the grievances of Tamil citizens who, as an ethnic minority, feel discriminated against or marginalised by the state.
There have also been calls, both from within and outside the country, for a process of reconciliation and healing, and for the government to be magnanimous in victory.
One Sri Lankan exile, also posting on the web, says he is concerned that a "hunt for Tigers and traitors will continue" - reflecting on the hard line the government has often taken towards dissenting voices and those it accuses of giving comfort to the rebels.
"We shouldn't be triumphalist," a Sinhala woman, who largely supported the government's campaign against the LTTE, told the BBC.
On the streets of Colombo there is jubilation and smiling faces as the firecrackers are lit.
"I'm very very happy. After 30 years we've won… victory, I suppose!" says a young woman in Pettah, an old market area near the city centre, almost in surprise.
She says she is proud of the president and intends to go home and put out flags.
Not only Sinhalese but also Tamil, Muslim and other people tell the BBC they are relieved.
For decades they had feared boarding buses or visiting temples, some said, for fear of bombs. Now they hope there will be peace.
'Pride'
There is patriotic satisfaction, too, in website postings by Sri Lankans.
Sri Lanka Rockz," says one.
Some take pride in the military. "Every time we all are with you, our great warriors... One nation - One flag - Sri Lanka."
The army says its operations are ended, that rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran is dead and troops now hold all of the island's territory for the first time since 1983.
Such news will have been greeted almost with disbelief by Sri Lankans, many of whom were born into war or barely remember the time before it.
"We're part of history!" says another posting. "Today is the first day of my life I'm living in a Sri Lanka where there is no war."
A taxi driver expresses the view that, with the top Tamil Tiger leaders out of the picture, bomb blasts really will become a thing of the past.
But will they?
End of the road
Some commentators have predicted that, after their military defeat, the Tigers will concentrate more on their hallmark bombing tactics - saying this will be made possible by the cells they maintain.
But one expert tells the BBC he does not accept that argument.
Maybe there will be stray cases, he says, but with so many of the top LTTE [Tamil Tigers] leaders reportedly killed by the army, he does not see what Tamils would want to kill themselves for.
After all, according to Prabhakaran's biographer MR Narayan Swamy, for the Tigers he was "their brain… their heart… their god… their soul".
Indeed, asked whether they would continue the guerrilla war, the LTTE's foreign-based international relations head, S Padmanathan, told Britain's Channel 4 television on Sunday he believed in a peaceful solution for the Tamil people.
The war started by the LTTE has left humanitarian suffering on a huge scale - including in its final stages.
Dealing with the suffering of the refugees, the wounded and the bereaved will loom high on Sri Lanka's agenda in the immediate future.
Almost a month ago, the United Nations said it feared 6,500 civilians had been killed and twice the number wounded in the war zone since January - civilians who, it alleged, were forcibly held there by the LTTE (although the rebels always denied that) and were caught in heavy crossfire.
It described more recent violence in the small rebel-controlled zone in the north-east of the country as a "bloodbath".
Doctors working in the area described hundreds of deaths and injuries at their makeshift clinics, having to abandon the facilities in the last days.
The government said it doubted their information, as they might have been speaking under LTTE pressure - but the UN trusted them as an impartial source.
Even on Monday the UN refugee agency's head in Sri Lanka, Amin Awad, said he was worried civilians might have been killed within the past 48 hours.
Ongoing grievances
Hundreds of thousands of traumatised, emaciated people have poured out of the combat zone in the past few weeks and now stay in difficult conditions in government-run camps.
The UN and humanitarian agencies will be hoping for better access to them now that the war is over.
The UN has also said it is concerned about the welfare of the doctors who are believed to have escaped the fighting but have not been heard from since.
The government says political reforms will also be on its agenda, reforms that will perhaps aim to tackle some of the grievances of Tamil citizens who, as an ethnic minority, feel discriminated against or marginalised by the state.
There have also been calls, both from within and outside the country, for a process of reconciliation and healing, and for the government to be magnanimous in victory.
One Sri Lankan exile, also posting on the web, says he is concerned that a "hunt for Tigers and traitors will continue" - reflecting on the hard line the government has often taken towards dissenting voices and those it accuses of giving comfort to the rebels.
"We shouldn't be triumphalist," a Sinhala woman, who largely supported the government's campaign against the LTTE, told the BBC.
Angry MPs turn on Commons Speaker
The Speaker of the House of Commons has been challenged by MPs to stand down in unprecedented scenes in the chamber.
Michael Martin did not mention his future in a statement on the expenses furore - instead he set out proposed action to reform the system.
He said he was "profoundly sorry" for his role and said all MPs must accept blame for the "terrible damage" done.
But a succession of MPs challenged him openly, saying they wanted a debate and a vote of no confidence in him.
It follows a week of damaging media revelations about MPs' expenses and criticism of the way Mr Martin has handled the row.
Claims stopped
In a statement to a packed Commons on Monday, Mr Martin apologised for the expenses scandal and outlined steps he would be taking ahead of the findings of an independent inquiry into the allowances system, expected in the autumn.
This included asking party leaders to meet him and members of the House of Commons Commission within 48 hours to look at what proposals for reform for second homes expenses could be agreed upon and put to MPs for approval.
In the meantime the Glasgow North East MP urged members not to submit expenses claims for approval.
"We all bear a heavy responsibility for the terrible damage to the reputation of this House. We must do everything we possibly can to regain the trust and confidence of the people," he said.
Labour's Gordon Prentice was the first to stand up to ask about the no confidence motion, only to be told it was not a "point of order" - to shouts of "oh yes it is".
Douglas Carswell, the Conservative backbencher who is putting forward the motion, got up to ask when it would be debated and when MPs would be able to choose a new Speaker with "moral authority to clean up Westminster and the legitimacy to lead this House out of the mire".
Norway debate
But he was told it was not a "substantive motion, it's an early day motion", which led to MPs shouting and Mr Martin having to seek clarification from a clerk.
Veteran Labour MP David Winnick asked him "with some reluctance" to give "some indication" as to when he would retire, saying "your early retirement sir, would help the reputation of the House".
Mr Martin replied that was "not a subject for today".
Veteran Conservative MP Sir Patrick Cormack likened the mood in the Commons to the mood in the nation for the Norway debate in 1940 - said to be the moment Conservative MPs realised that Neville Chamberlain had to be replaced as prime minister.
And another Conservative MP, Richard Shepherd, said the public would not believe MPs were serious about reform as long as Mr Martin remained as Speaker.
Senior Labour MP Sir Stuart Bell was one of the few to stick up for Mr Martin, saying there had "never been in the history of our land such an attack on the Speaker".
He added: "This House should calm itself down, should have a period of reflection."
The former Tory, now independent, MP Bob Spink also spoke in favour of the Speaker, saying he did not want to see him "become a scapegoat for the action of these members".
Senior Lib Dem MP David Heath said the statement would have been welcomed a few weeks ago but he now had "very grave doubts" as to whether they would restore trust.
'Political death warrant'
Others sought advice on how a debate on the Speaker's future could be tabled.
Former shadow home secretary David Davis asked: "Is it within the power of a backbencher to put down a substantive motion and if so, how?"
There were shouts when Mr Martin said that was a matter for the government.
Mr Martin also had to tell the Conservative MP Mark Field to watch his words when he suggested that some MPs had made fraudulent expenses claims.
Later Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, who was attacked by the Speaker last week for giving interviews about greater transparency on MPs' expenses, said Mr Martin "blew it".
"The effect of the statement is for the Speaker to have signed his own political death warrant... I give him less than a week," he told BBC News.
BBC political editor Nick Robinson said that while Mr Martin's statement may have bought him some breathing space, his fate still hung in the balance.
And, at a later meeting of Labour MPs, Mr Robinson said former Cabinet minister Peter Hain urged the prime minister not to try to prevent a debate on the Speaker's future.
The Speaker's critics blame him for various attempts to block requests in recent years to have expenses details released under Freedom of Information laws.
And he angered many by attacking MPs who had pressed for more transparency or criticised his decision to ask the police to investigate the leaking of expenses details to the Daily Telegraph.
Under parliamentary rules, the Speaker can either ignore the motion or ask for it to be debated in government time.
Not right
For MPs to openly criticise the Speaker breaks a long-standing Commons convention, while the last time a Speaker was forced from office was in 1695 - when Sir John Trevor was found guilty by the House of "a high crime and misdemeanour".
Mr Martin has been urged to stand down by Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown declined to give Mr Martin his backing, saying that "the decision about who is Speaker is a matter for the House of Commons - it could never be a matter for the government".
The BBC understands Mr Brown spoke to the Speaker on Sunday about the situation.
Any move to unseat the Speaker would have to be supported by the Conservatives.
But Conservative leader David Cameron said: "The leader of the main opposition party, a government in waiting, and his party cannot, I think, act unilaterally to remove the Speaker in the House of Commons - I don't think that would be right."
Michael Martin did not mention his future in a statement on the expenses furore - instead he set out proposed action to reform the system.
He said he was "profoundly sorry" for his role and said all MPs must accept blame for the "terrible damage" done.
But a succession of MPs challenged him openly, saying they wanted a debate and a vote of no confidence in him.
It follows a week of damaging media revelations about MPs' expenses and criticism of the way Mr Martin has handled the row.
Claims stopped
In a statement to a packed Commons on Monday, Mr Martin apologised for the expenses scandal and outlined steps he would be taking ahead of the findings of an independent inquiry into the allowances system, expected in the autumn.
This included asking party leaders to meet him and members of the House of Commons Commission within 48 hours to look at what proposals for reform for second homes expenses could be agreed upon and put to MPs for approval.
In the meantime the Glasgow North East MP urged members not to submit expenses claims for approval.
"We all bear a heavy responsibility for the terrible damage to the reputation of this House. We must do everything we possibly can to regain the trust and confidence of the people," he said.
Labour's Gordon Prentice was the first to stand up to ask about the no confidence motion, only to be told it was not a "point of order" - to shouts of "oh yes it is".
Douglas Carswell, the Conservative backbencher who is putting forward the motion, got up to ask when it would be debated and when MPs would be able to choose a new Speaker with "moral authority to clean up Westminster and the legitimacy to lead this House out of the mire".
Norway debate
But he was told it was not a "substantive motion, it's an early day motion", which led to MPs shouting and Mr Martin having to seek clarification from a clerk.
Veteran Labour MP David Winnick asked him "with some reluctance" to give "some indication" as to when he would retire, saying "your early retirement sir, would help the reputation of the House".
Mr Martin replied that was "not a subject for today".
Veteran Conservative MP Sir Patrick Cormack likened the mood in the Commons to the mood in the nation for the Norway debate in 1940 - said to be the moment Conservative MPs realised that Neville Chamberlain had to be replaced as prime minister.
And another Conservative MP, Richard Shepherd, said the public would not believe MPs were serious about reform as long as Mr Martin remained as Speaker.
Senior Labour MP Sir Stuart Bell was one of the few to stick up for Mr Martin, saying there had "never been in the history of our land such an attack on the Speaker".
He added: "This House should calm itself down, should have a period of reflection."
The former Tory, now independent, MP Bob Spink also spoke in favour of the Speaker, saying he did not want to see him "become a scapegoat for the action of these members".
Senior Lib Dem MP David Heath said the statement would have been welcomed a few weeks ago but he now had "very grave doubts" as to whether they would restore trust.
'Political death warrant'
Others sought advice on how a debate on the Speaker's future could be tabled.
Former shadow home secretary David Davis asked: "Is it within the power of a backbencher to put down a substantive motion and if so, how?"
There were shouts when Mr Martin said that was a matter for the government.
Mr Martin also had to tell the Conservative MP Mark Field to watch his words when he suggested that some MPs had made fraudulent expenses claims.
Later Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, who was attacked by the Speaker last week for giving interviews about greater transparency on MPs' expenses, said Mr Martin "blew it".
"The effect of the statement is for the Speaker to have signed his own political death warrant... I give him less than a week," he told BBC News.
BBC political editor Nick Robinson said that while Mr Martin's statement may have bought him some breathing space, his fate still hung in the balance.
And, at a later meeting of Labour MPs, Mr Robinson said former Cabinet minister Peter Hain urged the prime minister not to try to prevent a debate on the Speaker's future.
The Speaker's critics blame him for various attempts to block requests in recent years to have expenses details released under Freedom of Information laws.
And he angered many by attacking MPs who had pressed for more transparency or criticised his decision to ask the police to investigate the leaking of expenses details to the Daily Telegraph.
Under parliamentary rules, the Speaker can either ignore the motion or ask for it to be debated in government time.
Not right
For MPs to openly criticise the Speaker breaks a long-standing Commons convention, while the last time a Speaker was forced from office was in 1695 - when Sir John Trevor was found guilty by the House of "a high crime and misdemeanour".
Mr Martin has been urged to stand down by Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown declined to give Mr Martin his backing, saying that "the decision about who is Speaker is a matter for the House of Commons - it could never be a matter for the government".
The BBC understands Mr Brown spoke to the Speaker on Sunday about the situation.
Any move to unseat the Speaker would have to be supported by the Conservatives.
But Conservative leader David Cameron said: "The leader of the main opposition party, a government in waiting, and his party cannot, I think, act unilaterally to remove the Speaker in the House of Commons - I don't think that would be right."
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