Climate scandal

A UN panel is to investigate claims that scientists at a leading climate institute in Britain suppressed evidence backing the views of climate change skeptics and shielded data from scrutiny.

The claims, which revolve around e-mails from scientists at the University of East Anglia, have caused a significant stir just ahead of the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference.

The head of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, said the claims were serious and needed to be investigated.

"We will certainly go into the whole lot and then we will take a position on it," Pachauri told the BBC. "We certainly don't want to brush anything under the carpet. This is a serious issue and we will look into it in detail."

Hackers broke into the network of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) in Norwich, England, and posted thousands of e-mail from researchers.

Out of context?

Professor Phil Jones, whose e-mail were among those made public, temporarily stepped down from his position as head the CRU.

The e-mails have been seized upon by climate skeptics who allege that they undermine the entire scientific premise of climate change. The row has reached the US Congress, where skeptics, including many members of the Republican party, are seeking to thwart climate change legislation.

One exchange at the heart of the scandal is an e-mail from 1999 in which Jones discussed a "trick" to "hide the decline" in global temperatures. Jones has since denied having any agenda.

"The word 'trick' was used here colloquially as in a clever thing to do. It is ludicrous to suggest that it refers to anything untoward," he said last month.

Science is 'very clear'

Ed Miliband, Britain's climate change minister and the younger brother of Foreign Minister David Miliband, said the clamor over the scandal should not distract from the key message about climate change.

"We need maximum transparency including about all the data but it's also very, very important to say one chain of e-mails, potentially misrepresented, does not undo the global science," he said.

"The science is very clear about climate change and people should be in no doubt about that. There will be people that want to use this to try and undermine the science and we're not going to let them," he added.

sjt/AFP/AP
Editor: Kyle James