Small Island States

Small Island, originally uploaded by ] slowhands [.

Are urging the rich nations to cut green house gas emissions.

BONN, Germany (Reuters) - Small island states have sharpened their calls for the rich to make deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, saying low-lying atolls risk being washed off the map by rising ocean levels.

An alliance of 43 island states, backed by more than a dozen nations in Africa and Latin America, urged developed countries at U.N. climate talks in Bonn on Thursday to cut greenhouse emissions by "at least 45 percent below 1990 levels by 2020."

"The scientific findings about climate change are frightening," M.J. Mace, a legal advisor to the Federated States of Micronesia who presented the demands at the March 29-April 8 meeting, told Reuters.

No one in the US is trying to cut emmissions this much. It really is a global climate crisis for these peoples. Humans can swim but they can not live in the water.