Khaleej Times Online - German conservatives press for breaks in EU climate pact

BERLIN - German Chancellor Angela Merkel faced calls from fellow conservatives Sunday to fight to water down a European Union climate pact until the recession-wracked economy is moving again.

Bavarian premier Horst Seehofer said in an interview with the Bild am Sonntag newspaper that he had written to Merkel calling on her to back away from EU climate protection goals to be approved next month for a time.
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German Economy Minister Michael Glos, also of the Christian Social Union, the Bavarian sister party of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, agreed that Germany could ill-afford to make a priority of climate protection with the economy hobbled by the global financial crisis.

‘It is not the time to burden the economy with excessive environmental targets,’ he said.

And the conservative premier of Lower Saxony, Christian Wulff, also called for a two-year hiatus for the EU climate package, which is to be passed at a Brussels summit of EU leaders in three weeks.