Natural disasters caused by climate change have cost the world more than $60 billion this year, up from about $55 billion last year, says a report released yesterday by the U.N. Environment Program's Finance Initiative during the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in Milan. According to the report, compiled by insurance firm Munich Re, Europe's extreme summer heat wave was the biggest climate event of the year, costing more than $10 billion in agricultural losses and killing around 20,000 people.

The floods in the Huai and Yangtze Rivers in China between July and September were the second most costly events, with losses estimated at around $8 billion. Tornados in the United States in April and May accounted for the biggest insured losses - over $3 billion.

"We will have to get used to the fact that extreme summers, like the one we had in Europe this year, are to be expected more frequently in the future and that they will become more or less the norm by the middle of the century," said Thomas Loster, head of the UNEP Finance Initiative's climate change working group and Munich Re's head of weather/climate risks research.

UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer added that, "Climate change is not a prognosis, it is a reality that is, and will increasingly bring human suffering and economic hardship."

Toepfer welcomed the $400 million in pledges made in Milan to help developing nations cope with the impact of climate change (UNEP release, Dec. 10).

Despite the numbers presented in the study, some officials gathered in Milan said they still doubt the impact of global warming, BBC Online reports today.

"I'm becoming more and more convinced ... that global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people and the world," U.S. Senator and Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works James Inhofe told a conference briefing.

According to BBC Online, Inhofe's view is shared by many in the U.S. Congress (BBC Online, Dec. 11).

Yesterday, the Inuit people of Canada and Alaska announced in Milan that they are launching a human rights case against the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush, saying that the country is violating the people's human rights by not ratifying the Kyoto Protocol and refusing to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Inuit, which means "people," is the generic name given to indigenous people of the Arctic. Its populations include Canadian Inuit, Alaska's Inupiat and Yupik people and the Russian Yupik.

"We are already bearing the brunt of climate change - without our snow and ice our way of life goes," said Sheila Watt-Cloutier, the chairwoman of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, which represents 155,000 people. "We have lived in harmony with our surroundings for millennia, but that is being taken away from us."

Under the campaign, the Inuit people are asking the Washington-based Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to rule against the U.S. government, saying it is violating their human rights. Although the commission has no power to enforce any action, the campaigners believe the case will embarrass the U.S. government and educate the U.S. public.

"Most people have lost contact with the natural world," said Watt-Cloutier. "They even think global warming has benefits, like wearing a T-shirt in November, but we know the planet is melting and with it our vibrant culture, our way of life. We are an endangered species, too" (Paul Brown, London Guardian, Dec. 11).
Copyright, National Journal Group, Year.