PARIS, April 26: France is pushing for a “World Environment Organisation” that would put the environment on the same world footing as global trade, French Ecology Minister Roselyne Bachelot said on the sidelines of a G8 meeting here Saturday.

“The only world organisation which governs trade is the World Trade Organisation,” Bachelot said.

“We want environmental criteria to be taken into account in the same way. At the moment that is virtually not the case at the moment ... In the future, no policy would be able to exempt itself from the need to protect the environment,” she said.

Bachelot made her remarks on the radio station Europe 1 on the second day of a three-day Group of Eight (G8) environment ministers’ meeting.—AFP