Nepal cabinet meets at Everest to send climate message

Nepal's cabinet began a meeting close to the base camp of Mount Everest on Friday (December 4) to send a message on the impact of global warming on the Himalayas, days before global climate meeting in Copenhagen. Wearing oxygen masks and heavy jackets, Nepal's Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and more than 20 ministers flew in by helicopter to meet at 5,242 metres (17,200 feet) above sea level with Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain, towering in the backdrop. The base camp is the point from where climbers to the Everest summit begin their ascent. About 100 world leaders will meet in the Danish capital for the Dec. 7-18 UN summit on combating global warming. For its part, Kathmandu is sending along some of its renowned Everest climbers to highlight the challenges facing Nepal, such as floods from glacier melting, erratic rains, longer dry spells and unprecedented forest fires. Home to eight of the world's 14 tallest peaks, including Mount Everest, Nepal is vulnerable to climate change despite being responsible for only 0.025 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, among the world's lowest, officials say. Thousands of glaciers in the Himalayas that are the source of water for 10 major Asian rivers could go dry in the next five decades because of global warming, experts say. So this gesture by the Nepali cabinet speaks volumes about it and it really says that though the glaciers are melting at a slower pace but it is still a clear and present danger for everyone, one unidentified bystander told reporters. In freezing temperatures and surrounded by snowy peaks, Nepal's cabinet began meeting at Kala Patthar, a small patch of grassy land that is also one of the target destinations for trekkers. The meeting follows in the footsteps of the Maldives government, which held the world's first underwater cabinet meeting in October to underline how rising sea levels are threatening the Indian Ocean archipelago's existence.