News from Milan 10 December 03

...is that there isn’t any. I’m hearing that there is already official agreement on the bits of Kyoto’s small print that were still remaining to be sorted out, but somehow I can’t raise much enthusiasm about it. It’s like we’re living in a bubble, and no-one’s quite sure if it’s real or not. The ministers are giving their speeches, and the German environment minister Jurgen Trittin told me that official policy in the EU was just to pretend that Kyoto was already ratified and go ahead on that basis. Meanwhile the Americans – who make my flesh creep every time I see them (remember the ‘dementors’ in Harry Potter?) – are giving press conferences about how nuclear reactors and planting genetically modified trees will solve everything for us. Scary and depressing in equal measure.