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| Al Gore says Canada's Tories misrepresented him The Associated Press Published: February 12, 2007 OTTAWA: Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore is taking Canada's Conservative government to task for suggesting he endorsed its performance on climate change. The environmentalist, filmmaker and past presidential candidate issued a statement Monday to distance himself from the claim by the government of Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. "I understand that last week Canada's minister of the environment, John Baird, mischaracterized comments I made last summer as praise for the Harper government's actions on global warming," Gore wrote. "The comments I made were designed to encourage the Harper government not to abandon Canada's tradition of fighting above its weight class on the world stage as part of the Kyoto process," Gore said. "It is my experience that other nations do look to Canada for moral leadership. ... I urge the Harper government to do the right thing." Against Gore's urging, the Conservative government has abandoned Canada's greenhouse-gas reduction commitments under the Kyoto Protocol, rejecting its targets as unattainable. The government has instead called for a series of other programs to fight global warming. ... |