The issue of a human-induced climate change has already produced some tensions among countries and regions. In the discussions at the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development, in Rio in 1992, it was clear that the consideration of a changing climate involved disagreements, especially between industrial and developing nations. A careful reading of Agenda 21 or the Climate Change Convention, both of which were adopted and since ratified, reveals that developing country representatives view the problem of climate change as one created by the industrial world and that therefore the rich countries are obligated to assist developing countries in meeting any treaty requirements designed to slow climate change. Meanwhile, industrial countries see China sitting on top of giant coal deposits and harboring a very rapidly growing industrialism, the combination of which could add appreciably in the coming decades to the emission of carbon dioxide.
An example of a more specific threat to international harmony
arises from shared fresh water resources
[4]
[ Gleick 1992]. A warmer
climate with redistributed precipitation could result in a changed
flow in shared rivers; competition for the shared waters arising
from increases in population and industrialization has already led
to tensions, threats, and diplomatic encounters, and these problems
would be exacerbated if there were a decrease in river flow.