[Mb-civic] Clinton Gathers World Leaders - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Clinton Gathers World Leaders
Nonpartisan Conference Focuses on Global Improvement

By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 16, 2005; Page A02

NEW YORK, Sept. 15 -- The U.N. General Assembly may have failed this 
week to come up with a stirring plan to combat the world's ills. But 
there was former president Bill Clinton -- once said to have harbored an 
ambition to become secretary general -- assembling his own mini-General 
Assembly of presidents, prime ministers, kings and other pooh-bahs on 
Thursday to devise specific plans for addressing poverty, global 
warming, religious conflict and better governance.

The inaugural meeting of what he has dubbed the Clinton Global 
Initiative will stretch over three days of seminars and speeches, 
bringing together 800 movers and shakers who paid $15,000 each for a 
seat. If the opening session is any guidepost, the meetings resemble the 
gabfests at Davos, the annual global economic summit held in 
Switzerland, or the Renaissance Weekends that Clinton attended as 
president. But Clinton added a catch -- each of the attendees is 
required to commit to doing something to improve the world.
"This is more than a photo op, more than business as usual," Clinton 
said as he opened the session. "All of us come to meetings, we study 
issues, we say what we think, and too often we complain when the 
governments that we seek to influence ignore what we think is our sound 
advice."

So every person attending is required to make a commitment in writing. 
More than 50 commitments have been made, totaling more than $300 
million. Clinton announced four specific commitments -- signed on the 
spot for the cameras -- which included a $100 million Africa investment 
fund and a plan to fight HIV-AIDS through micro-enterprise development. 
One commitment was made by the Clinton initiative itself -- a pledge 
that all of its activities would be "carbon neutral," promising to 
mitigate the effects of plane travel and conference preparation by 
financing renewable energy projects that replace fossil-fuel energy sources.

"What is happening here is the kind of intense dialogue between 
different people and cultures which should take place at the U.N. but 
can't anymore because of highly ritualistic structures, protocol and 
conflict avoidance," said Richard C. Holbrooke, a former U.N. ambassador 
under Clinton who made the HIV-AIDS commitment.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/15/AR2005091502372.html?nav=hcmodule
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