WASHINGTON -- African leaders including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Jay Naidoo of former President Nelson Mandela's cabinet, and Zwelinzima Vavi, general secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, on Wednesday released an ad calling on Canada to step up the battle against global warming, rather than actively promote the use of its tar sands.
The ad comes just days after Canada signaled at climate negotiations in Durban, South Africa that it would likely pull out of Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty aimed at combating global warming. The treaty is scheduled to expire in 2012.
"By walking away from Kyoto, the Canadian government is also damaging our reputation as a country that keeps its word," said Gillian McEachern of Environmental Defence, one of the groups behind the ad. "The tar sands are not only turning us into a polluting nation, but also into one that will break its commitments in the service of dirty oil."
Canada has already angered many environmentalists with its efforts to push crude oil from its tar sands in Alberta to oil refineries along the Gulf Coast, a move that NASA scientist and leading climatologÂist James Hansen has said would be "game over for our climate."
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