By Han Miao

Special to the Tsinghua News Center

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair delivered a speech to Tsinghua students entitled “A Global Deal in Climate Change: the Role of Business and New Technologies” on March 24 in the Lecture Hall of the School of Economics Management.

In his speech, Mr. Blair explained the basis of the global agreement and the major challenges in dealing with climate change. He said the present economic downturn presents a good opportunity to solve this problem. He urged governments to make sure a substantial amount of stimulus investment flows into the new clean energy sector. He also broke down the challenges facing all countries into specific aspects. He said people should realize that the responsibility for tackling climate change is not restricted to government, but every one must shoulder some responsibility.

Mr. Blair then answered students’ questions in the discuss session. The subjects of the questions included new clean energy, the global financial crisis, the London Olympics, and university life.

Tsinghua Vice President Xie Weihe had a talk with Mr. Blair prior to the speech.

Mr. Blair previously had visited Tsinghua University in July of 2003, when he and Tsinghua University President Gu Binglin inaugurated the Tsinghua-BP Clean Energy Research and Education Center.

(Photo by Guo Haijun)