Latest 2008 G8 summit news:

Saturday, June 28, 2008
G8 COUNTDOWN

G8 trivia quiz of the day:
Together India, China, and South Korea make up 65 percent of the world’s what?
Carbon emissions and energy demand.

AND THAT WAS TOTALLY WRONG AS THE ATTACHED SOURCE ATTESTS.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008 By TAKUYA KARUBE,Kyodo News

AOMORI — Group of Eight energy ministers have agreed on establishing a new international framework aimed at facilitating energy-saving measures to temper climate change and soaring fuel costs, at a time when crude oil is closing in on $140 a barrel.

Japan, which hosted a one-day meeting of the ministers Sunday, and the other G8 members decided to set up the International Partnership for Energy Efficiency Cooperation and invited China, India, South Korea and other countries to participate in the initiative.

The G8 powers and the three Asian countries, which are responsible for about 65 percent of the world’s energy demand and carbon dioxide emissions, said they share “serious concerns over the current level of oil prices.”

“Recognizing the crucial role of financial and macroeconomic policies in resolving current economic issues, all of us responsible for energy policy should work together,” the energy ministers of the 11 countries said in a joint statement.

This is the first time energy ministers from the G8, China, India and South Korea have all met together and discussed pending issues.

In addition to climate change, soaring food and oil prices are increasing the risk of economic and political instability on a global scale, especially in developing countries, and they will be central agenda items at the G8 summit next month in Hokkaido.

But when it came to singling out the main cause of the turmoil, delegates refrained from going into details, Japanese officials said.

AND THE TWO MAIN NEWS OF THE DAY:

Blair in Tokyo shifts focus on climate to Copenhagen conference.
By JUN HONGO
The Group of Eight leaders gathering next month in Hokkaido should not attempt to resolve all climate issues up to 2050 or even 2020, but instead focus on setting a clear course for an agreement at next year’s U.N. conference in Copenhagen, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Friday in Tokyo.

Ministers slam Mugabe one-man poll ’sham.’
By ERIC JOHNSTON
KYOTO — The Group of Eight foreign ministers strongly denounced Zimbabwe’s regime at the Friday end of their two-day summit in Kyoto, with several calling the country’s one-candidate runoff presidential election the same day a sham and threatening further U.N. Security Council action.

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Regarding the UNSG Passing Today Through Japan, the Japanese web says:

In an interview in New York, ahead of the trip, Ban expressed hope that Self-Defense Forces personnel will participate in U.N. peacekeeping operations in Sudan.

“I would welcome the Self-Defense Forces’ participation in the United Nations Mission in Sudan,” he said.

The government is studying dispatching the Ground Self-Defense Force to southern parts of Sudan to engage in road construction and other duties in the war-torn country.

The U.N. has requested that Japan join the 10,000-member U.N. mission of more than 70 countries monitoring compliance with a 2005 ceasefire agreement between the Sudanese government and antigovernment rebels.

Ban said Japan’s “capacities and assets” would be “a great contribution.”

“I would hope that Japan, with your very strengthened capacities, will contribute more in very specialized areas like logistics, engineering,” he said.

Such a dispatch would involve Japan’s first full-fledged participation in U.N. peacekeeping operations since 2002, when an SDF civil engineering unit was sent to East Timor on a two-year mission.

The government is expected to make a final decision after it sends an advance team to Sudan this summer.

On climate change, the U.N. chief said he hopes Japan will take the initiative in getting talks on a post-Kyoto Protocol framework moving when the G8 leaders gather in Hokkaido from July 7 to 9.

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When the UNSG expresses a wish to have Japan Personnel for Sudan, we assume they already encouraged his request - and this will then be seen as a Hokkaido achievement. So, here we get the first swallow of 2008 G8 promise.