Ban v Inhofe – UN chief urges policymakers to reject climate sceptics' campaign

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon waded into the ongoing row over the so-called Climategate affair yesterday, urging world leaders to resist 'last-ditch' efforts by climate sceptics to block action to tackle climate change.

In a statement read out by officials at the opening of the annual meeting of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) in Indonesia, Ban insisted climate change continued to present "a clear and present danger" to the world's security and prosperity.

He said progress towards curbing greenhouse gas emissions had been achieved at the Copenhagen Summit and called on world leaders to continue to pursue the goal of delivering a binding international climate change treaty later this year.

"To maintain the momentum, I urge you to reject last-ditch attempts by climate sceptics to derail your negotiations by exaggerating shortcomings in the [IPCC] report," he added.

Ban's comments came as senior Republican senators in the US stepped up efforts to use recent uncovering of errors in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's report and the failure to properly respond to freedom of information by scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) to block proposed carbon regulations.

Republican senators on the Committee on Environment and Public Works, led by vocal climate change sceptic James Inhofe, yesterday released an 84-page report analysing documents and emails that were hacked from the CRU. It concluded the "climategate" documents provided evidence of "unethical and potentially illegal behaviour by some of the world's pre-eminent climate scientists".

The report added that coupled with errors in the IPCC report, the affair " cast serious doubt" on the Environmental Protection Agency's recent ruling that carbon emissions pose a threat to human health and can be regulated under the existing Clean Air Act. It concluded that "instead of moving forward on greenhouse gas regulation, the agency should fully address the CRU controversy and the IPCC's flawed science".

The report was released to coincide with the committee's quizzing of EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, who offered a robust defence of the science used as the basis of the endangerment finding, insisting the science is "settled and human activity is responsible for global warming".

Inhofe challenged Jackson's conclusions, insisting the "climategate" emails show there was no consensus surrounding climate science. "We've been told that the science still stands," he said. "We've been told that the IPCC's mistakes are trivial. We've been told that Climategate is just gossipy emails between a few scientists. But now we know there's no objective basis for these claims. Furthermore, Climategate shows there's no consensus – the science is far from settled."

His comments drew a robust response from colleagues on the committee, including committee chairwoman, Democrat senator Barbara Boxer, who insisted " the majority of this committee believes in strong numbers that we must act on" to tackle carbon emissions.