Oct 20 2009
On Oct. 17, Mohamed Nasheed, president of the Maldives, an island country off the coast of India, held a meeting of his Cabinet underwater to dramatize the risks he says his country faces from rising sea levels caused by global warming. Yesterday, Swedish scientist Nils-Axel Mörner, a specialist in sea level changes, wrote Mr. Nasheed the following letter:
Open Letter
October 20, 2009
To: President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldives
From: Nils-Axel Mörner, Stockholm, Sweden
Mr. President,
You have recently held an undersea Cabinet meeting to raise awareness of the idea that global sea level is rising and hence threatens to drown the Maldives. This proposition is not founded in observational facts and true scientific judgments.
Therefore, I am most surprised at your action and must protest its intended message.
In 2001, when our research group found overwhelming evidence that sea level was by no means in a rising mode in the Maldives, but had remained quite stable for the last 30 years, I thought it would not be respectful to the fine people of the Maldives if I were to return home and present our results in international fora.