The United States defended itself yesterday against charges of obstructing progress at the Earth Summit and claimed to be a world leader in helping the poor.

The real new money on the table is zero. It is an old American government game. Take money that has already been promised three or four times over and promise it a fifth time.

Philip Clapp National Environment Trust

But senior officials admitted that America was "not offering a huge amount of money" to support the summit's 10-year plan of action, which aims to solve the poor's environmental problems.

Paula Dobriansky, the US under secretary for global affairs, claimed that America, which is refusing to accept targets at the summit, was "the world's leader in sustainable development".

Miss Dobriansky outlined five initiatives America is proposing - including a £634 million water for the poor initiative to expand access to clean water and sanitation in developing countries - but declined to say from where the money would come.

Suspicions were aroused that the Bush administration was promising money it had previously pledged as part of the Monterrey conference on development aid, in which America raised the proportion of GNP it gives in development aid for the first time since the 1960s.

Officials named various large sums, such as £35 million for a Congo forest partnership promoting better forest management over four years and an injection of £800 million to combat HIV and malaria. But none would say whether this funding came from the same Monterrey pot.

Andrew Natsios, the administrator of the Agency of International Development, conceded that, as to new US help on offer, "It's not a huge amount of money."

Philip Clapp, of the National Environment Trust, a US-based environmental group, said: "The real new money on the table is zero. It is an old American government game. Take money that has already been promised three or four times over and promise it a fifth time."

Of America's behaviour at the summit, he said: "The Bush administration has been completely inflexible. The simple reason is that the Right wing of the Republican party regards this summit as a second Rio and wants it killed in its cradle."

Tony Juniper, of Friends of the Earth, said America's claim to being a leader in sustainable development was "breathtaking" coming after its repudiation of the Kyoto climate treaty.

The German Chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, called on America yesterday to ratify the Kyoto protocol, saying it was "the minimum standard that should be applied globally".

© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2002

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