Media Linking Killer Tsunami to Global Warming

28 December 2004David ThibaultCNSNews.com Managing Editor(CNSNews.com) - With the world's attention focused on the earthquake/tsunami that has claimed tens of thousands of lives in at least ten countries that surround the Indian Ocean, media organizations like Reuters are pinning part of the blame for the catastrophe on "global warming.""A creeping rise in sea levels tied to global warming, pollution and damage to coral reefs may make coastlines even more vulnerable to disasters like tsunamis or storms in [the] future," wrote Alister Doyle, an environmental correspondent for Reuters, who attributed the opening paragraph of the story to "experts." However, Doyle's story did not contain any quotes directly mentioning the theory of global warming. Instead, Doyle's narrative referred to the controversial subject. "Global warming, poorly planned coastal development and other threats over which humans have some control are weakening natural defenses ranging from mangrove swamps to coral reefs that help keep the oceans at bay," Doyle wrote. Brad Smith of the environmental group Greenpeace was quoted in the Reuters story, but only as follows: "Coasts are under threat in many countries ... Development of roads, shrimp farms, ribbon development along coasts and tourism are eroding natural defenses in Asia." According to Doyle, "Scientists say a build-up of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere from human burning of fossil fuels threatens to trigger more powerful storms and raise sea levels, exposing coasts to more erosion."Island nations like the Maldives, swamped by the tsunami, could literally disappear beneath the waves if seas rise," Doyle added in the Reuters story without using expert quotes to back up the assertion. "[I]n Bangladesh, 17 million people live less than one meter above sea level, as do many in Florida in the United States," Doyle reported. Richard Klein, a senior researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, was quoted on how poor regions of the world are more vulnerable to natural disasters. "Vulnerability has as much a social dimension as an environmental one," Klein told Reuters. Two weeks ago, at a United Nations climate change conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Cybercast News Service reporter Marc Morano spoke with a former member of Greenpeace who had just urged people attending the conference to ignore the issue of global warming."Climate change is a huge thing, but there is very little that we can do about it," Bjorn Lomborg told Morano. Lomborg, an associate professor of statistics at the University of Aarhus in Denmark, said world governments would be wise to worry less about climate change and concentrate instead on problems he considers solvable, like AIDS, poverty and inadequate sanitation.