War and Climate

Mass migrations and war: Dire climate scenario
Charles J. Hanley (AP, 2/21/09)

(PLAY VIDEO)

CAPE TOWN, South Africa – If we don't deal with climate change decisively, "what we're talking about then is extended world war," an eminent economist said.

His audience Saturday, small and elite, had been stranded here by bad weather and were talking climate. They couldn't do much about the one, but the other was squarely in their hands. So, Lord Nicholas Stern was telling them, was the potential for mass migrations setting off mass conflict.

"Somehow we have to explain to people just how worrying that is," the British economic thinker said. More>>

Antarctica: a meeting of polar and political minds

Charles J. Hanley (AP, 2/23/09)

TROLL RESEARCH STATION, Antarctica – Policymakers met polar explorers on the boundless ice of Antarctica Monday as a U.S.-Norwegian scientific expedition came in from the cold to report on the continent's ice sheets, a potential source for a catastrophic "big melt" from global warming.

"Our preliminary finding is that there's a slight warming trend in East Antarctica," American glaciologist Ted Scambos told the group of visiting environment ministers. More>>

PHOTOS: 11/9/07 file photo shows melting icebergs in Antarctica. Environment representatives of more than a dozen nations arrived at a remote Norwegian research station in Antarctica 2/23/09 to learn more about the danger the continent's melting ice might pose to the planet (AP/Roberto Candia/file).

.

Member of a group visiting environment ministers and other representatives from more than a dozen nations gazes up at the monumental rock towers rising from 1,500-foot-deep ice sheets near the Norwegian Troll Research Station in Antarctica on 2/23/09. The group flew in to the remote station to learn from international scientists about weather and how global warming may melt Antarctic ice, raising sea levels (AP/Charles J. Hanley).

Close Look at Antartic Ice Threat

A parka-clad band of environment ministers landed in this remote corner of the icy continent on Monday, in the final days of an intense season of climate research, to learn more about how a melting Antarctica may endanger the planet.

Representatives from more than a dozen nations, including the U.S., China, Britain and Russia, were to rendezvous at a Norwegian research station with American and Norwegian scientists coming in on the last leg of a 1,400-mile (2,300-kilometer), two-month trek over the ice from the South Pole. More>>