Gorbachev backs Kyoto treaty

Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev today urged the US and Australia to sign the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, saying the world’s “reservoir of life” was rapidly shrinking.

Australia and the US are the only major industrialised countries that have not signed the Kyoto treaty, which mandates specific cutbacks in emissions of carbon dioxide and five other gases by 2012 in 35 countries.