Swedish visit may put heat on PM
The King of Sweden is forbidden by law from talking about politics and prevented by custom from saying anything too critical, but on the subject of global warming he chafes at these restraints.
"I am an objective monarch. I don't interfere, but I can always raise the question - it's not forbidden to ask a question," said King Carl XVI Gustaf.
And he is considering asking about global warming when he visits Australia next month on his third visit in 22 years.
Australia and the United States are the only developed countries that have refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, an agreement aimed at reducing carbon emissions, suspected of being a source of global warming.
In an interview in one of the 608 rooms in Sweden's 250-year-old palace, the third-biggest in Europe, the king and his wife, Queen Silvia, posed a number of questions on the environment.
Queen Silvia twice asked Australian reporters whether the Howard Government had any intention of ratifying the protocol.
It does not: the Government had proposed reaching an alternative arrangement with five Asia-Pacific countries - the US, China, India, Japan and South Korea - beginning with a ministerial meeting in Adelaide next month. But this has been postponed until next year because the US and China were not able to send representatives.
With hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the recent past and Wilma in the near future, King Carl Gustaf had some more questions.
"It is unfortunate that there are all these catastrophes, and people ask lots of questions. Why are there so many hurricanes? Why do so many of these hurricanes have stronger winds?
"There are more storms with stronger winds, and the public will raise these questions, and want to know why, and hopefully we can raise these questions."
The questions seem to be only a device, however, because the king offers an answer. Hurricanes result from imbalances in the temperature of different parts of the ocean: "As water temperatures increase, that will lead to a stronger imbalance, so there will be stronger hurricanes in the future, definitely."
The scientific community is less adamant. A recent study in the journal Nature by a professor of atmospheric science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Kerry Emanuel, found that hurricanes had strengthened by about 50 per cent over the past three decades.
While this upswing does coincide with a rise in sea surface temperatures, there is no established causal link. It is a highly controversial question.
Does the king intend raising environmental issues when he is in Australia, where he is to meet the Prime Minister, John Howard, and some of his ministers?
"We will see. All possibilities are there. We can ask the question."
The royal couple are due in Australia on November 7 on a state visit, travelling with Sweden's Foreign Minister and a business delegation.
The couple will visit Canberra, Sydney, Adelaide, Uluru and Perth. They will attend a conference in Sydney on the fast-growing sector known as e-health, using information technology health care. The field is a prospective one for Australian-Swedish collaboration.