The knife twists -but does it hurt?

I'm beginning to doubt if Richard North is a nice person. First he and Christopher Booker wallop Rajendra Pachauri just when he is back from Copenhagen,all weak and pooped from trying to save this sinful world, and so least expecting a blow. Now North twists the knife-

Not only has Dr R K Pachauri, chairman of the UN's IPCC been developing a very significant portfolio of private interests, evidence is mounting that he has been carrying out his business activities for these organisations under the guise of his UN duties, and charging the expenses to the UN.

This has emerged in part from an official document published by the IPCC Secretariat late August 2008 in response to public questions about Pachauri's "carbon footprint" arising from his globe-trotting activities.

Under the title "Outreach activities carried out by the IPCC Chairman", covering his itinerary for January 2007 to July 2008, the main purpose was to reassure the public that, while engaged on UN activities he had indeed flown many miles, in each case the UN had paid "carbon offsets" for the flights – details of which were listed against each "official" engagement.

However, unwittingly, this document has revealed more than either the UN – and certainly Dr Pachauri – had intended. It provides effective proof that, on more than one occasion Pachauri was indeed using UN funding for his own commercial interests.

One egregious example of this comes on 7 July 2008, when – in amongst his 443,243 miles flown in the 19-month period - Dr Pachauri is recorded by the UN as having travelled 1,432 miles from Abu Dhabi, where he was attending the Zayed Future Energy Prize Award, to visit Delhi for what is officially described as "Visit of Basque delegation to TERI".

There, he meets José Antonio -Tontxu- Campos Granados, Minister Of Education, Universities And Research and Esther Larrañaga Galdos, Minister Of Environment And Land Use Planning, both from the Basque Government. No other business is recorded that day, or at all until 14 July when, at the UN's expense, he flies 3,446 miles to Vienna for a UN ceremony.

However, while the UN records this as official business, the Basque delegation is perhaps unaware of this. On one of its own official websites, it records that the delegation visited the TERI offices to meet its Director General, Dr RK Pachauri, in order to sign a collaboration agreement between TERI and their own research institute, the Basque Institute Centre on Climate Change (BC3) – which had only been set up the previous April.

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Another "partner" to the programme is, incidentally, the University of East Anglia, home of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of Climategate fame.

Whatever the finer details of the arrangement with the Basques might have been, however, what is amply clear is that their official visit to Delhi on 7 July to meet Pachauri in Delhi had nothing whatsoever to do with UN business – and everything to do with Pachauri's personal position as Director General of TERI.

For that, at UN expense, Pachauri took a 1,432 miles from Abu Dhabi to get to Delhi and then a 3,446-mile trip to Vienna, totalling 4,878 miles. The direct route from Abu Dhabi to Vienna is 2,637 miles, with Pachauri's private business adding over 2,000 miles to his journey.

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In most jurisdictions, this kind of deception is regarded as theft and most employers treat gross misuse of expenses as a sackable offence. For the gifted and so far untouchable Dr Pachauri, however, this seems to be just another perk of the job.

Read the whole thing.


There are simply too many revelations now out for Pachauri to continue at the helm of the IPCC.Even if we assume that he did not amass a fortune(a big if) using his influence inappropriately, his conflicts of interests are glaring and undeniable.The excuse that he did it for TERI, a non-profit, does not wash. Top-notch non-profits are a very far cry from some local outfit of salvation army type misty-eyed stragglers.They have lavish offices all over the world and their budgets run in tens and sometimes hundreds of millions.Their top honchos are wined and dined and awarded in the highest places and palaces.

The big non-profits are the new elites.

Pachauri lives the life of a king - king of influence. He may sleep on a hard bed and get by on broccoli and water(not bottled water, I hope) and otherwise live the life of a saint -though I doubt it, it is all irrelevant.His game is power,his drug is the adrenalin rush of trying to save the planet by remaking it drastically in the image of his dharma -radical environmentalism.He is the Guru of the World. Presidents and prime ministers seek him for his "wisdom", as he seeks them to impart it.It's heady stuff.

That is why he appears testy and flustered when confronted firmly- as North and Booker have now done.

The heat is on(and I don't mean global warming) -the challenge is not to let it cool down, or the most dangerous man in the world will get away.