All set for Paris

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop recently issued a rather long joint statement detailing the fruitful ground covered during her visit earlier this month to Washington for consultations with Secretary of State John Kerry and senior US officials. Defence cooperation, fisheries policy, border protection, cyber security, ISIS — the document’s attention darts with a blowfly’s picayune enthusiasm from topic to topic until, at last, it settles in its final paragraph on what is, without doubt, a theme guaranteed to dismay those who may have had reservations about other aspects of Tony Abbott’s prime ministership but nevertheless appreciated his reluctance to sacrifice Australia’s economy before Gaia’s altar.

Below is that ominous final paragraph:

Recognizing the challenge climate change poses to the security and livelihoods of all, the United States and Australia reiterated their resolve to work toward an ambitious climate agreement at the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework on Climate Change in Paris later in 2015.

The language of diplomacy thrives on circumlocution and tactful euphemism. Take “ambitious climate agreement” to stand for the transfer of wealth to bureaucrats, bankers and Third World kleptocrats as Malcolm Turnbull’s solution to a problem that, if it existed in the first place, has been abeyance for almost 19 years.

The Foreign Minister’s statement can be read in full via the link below.

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