Germans and French clash over carbon tariffs

I picked this up on a tweet from Green Energy News who themselves were linking to Reuters - SO IT MUST BE TRUE.

Apparently age old friends and occasional golf partners France and Germany are falling out over President for Life Sarkozy's claim that countries who do not make an effort to address climate change should be subject to Carbon Tariffs. This would mean that Countries which refused to play ball on reducing emissions might be subject to punitive trade sanctions making it difficult for them to sell their goods overseas.

Now, here is the conundrum, a particularly difficult one for those of a green liberal persuasion. Obviously you need people to address climate change, but then you run the risk of having people in developing countries say, 'its you guys that caused this problem building your rapacious economies, now in addition to keeping us in economic subservience you want to break our legs as we try to walk.'

What Mr. Flanders might call a doozy of a pickle.