Press Review 11 April

by Lance  King

Article published on the 2008-04-11 Latest update 2008-04-17 17:27 TU

The Olympic torch, human rights and environmental degradation are making the headlines this morning.

The left-wing Libération heads with the Olympics and China's human rights record.

The games are approaching, says Libération, but freedom is not.

This paper says that Beijing is not paying attention to international pressure to end its repression in Tibet and improve its human-rights record in the build up to the Games.

This comes as the International Olympics Committee's president, Jacques Rogge, reminded China on Thursday of its pre-Olympic promises.

He said that before granting China the Olympics, representatives said that bringing the Olympics to China would advance human rights, although on moral grounds more than judicial.

Rogge asked China to respect this engagement, to which the Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs responded by reminding the committee that the Olympic charter stipulates that politics are not to be introduced into the games.

The right-wing Le Figaro says that two out of three French are in favour of boycotting the Olympic's opening ceremony.

Precisely. According to opinion way, 67% of French people interviewed said that France should not send a delegation to the ceremony. However, 64% are opposed to boycotting the actual games.

On Tuesday, French President Nicholas Sarkozy called for dialogue between Beijing and the Dalai Lama, saying that his position on boycotting the opening would depend on this.

The Centrist daily Le Monde says that climate change may have already reached dangerous levels. At least that's the opinion of James Hansen, an American scientist who spoke to Le Monde.

He says that the current threshold for carbon dioxide levels is generally set at 550 parts per million. After a study he concluded that we must revise that figure and set the limit at 350, which is scary, because we are already beyond that, at 385.

According to the business daily Les Echos, the French government is going to try and do its part to save the planet, if it's not already too late.

A proposed law to make France the least polluting economy in the European Union by 2020 is now on President Nicholas Sarkozy's desk.

The law calls for the renovation of public buildings to make them more efficiently insulated. A project that is expected to cost 24 billion euros.

Jean Louis Borloo, the environment minister, hopes to present the text to the cabinet in May. Let's hope it's not too late.