COCHABAMBA, Bolivia - Bolivian President

Evo Morales said capitalism is to blame for global warming and the

accelerated deterioration of the planetary ecosystem in a speech today

opening an international conference on climate change and the "rights

of Mother Earth."

More than 20,000 indigenous, environmental and civil society

delegates from 129 countries were in attendance as President Morales

welcomed them to the conference at a soccer stadium in the village of

Tiquipaya on the outskirts of the city of Cochabamba.

"The main cause of the destruction of the planet Earth is capitalism

and in the towns where we have lived, where we respected this Mother

Earth, we all have the ethics and the moral right to say here that the

central enemy of Mother Earth is capitalism," said Morales, who is

Bolivia's first fully indigenous head of state in the 470 years since

the Spanish invasion.

Morales is the leader of a political party called Movimiento al

Socialismo, the Movement for Socialism, which aims to give more power

to the country's indigenous and poor communities by means of land

reforms and redistribution of wealth from natural resources such as

gas.

"The capitalist system looks to obtain the maximum possible

gain, promoting unlimited growth on a finite planet," said Morales.

"Capitalism is the source of asymmetries and imbalance in the world."

The Bolivian president called this conference in the wake of

what he considered to be failed United Nations climate negotiations in

Copenhagen in December.

Those talks produced a weak political agreement, the Copenhagen Accord,

instead of a strong, legally-binding set of limits on greenhouse gas

emissions to take effect at the end of 2012, as Bolivia and many other

countries had hoped.

Named "World Hero of Mother Earth" by the United

Nations General Assembly last October, today, President Morales warned

of dire consequences if a strong legally-binding agreement to limit

greenhouse gas emissions is not reached.

A new agreement is needed to govern greenhouse gas emissions

after the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol expires at the

end of 2012. This year's round of international negotiations towards an

agreement began earlier this month in Bonn, Germany, and the next

annual United Nations climate conference is scheduled for Cancun,

Mexico from November 29.

"Global food production will be reduced by approximately 40

percent and that will increase the number of hungry people in the

world, which already exceeds a billion people," Morales warned.

"Between 20 and 30 percent of all animal and plant species could

disappear."

Global warming will cause the melting of the polar ice caps and

the glaciers of the Andes and the Himalayas, and several islands will

disappear under the ocean," he warned.

The convocation this morning included a multi-cultural blessing

ceremony by indigenous peoples from across the Americas. Speeches by

representatives of social movements from five continents focused on the

urgency of the climate crisis and the need for bold action that

protects both human rights and the environment.

The delegates are meeting in working group sessions this week to

develop strategies and make policy proposals on issues such as forests,

water, climate debt, and finance.

President Morales has pledged to bring these strategies and proposals to the UN climate conference in Cancun.

"We have traveled to Bolivia because President Morales has

committed to bring our voices to the global stage at the next round of

talks in Cancun," said Jihan Gearon of the Navajo Nation in Arizona,

who is a native energy organizer with the Indigenous Environmental

Network.

"Indigenous rights and knowledge are crucial to addressing climate

change, but the United States and Canada have not signed on to the UN

Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and are pushing

corporate climate policy agendas that threaten our homelands and

livelihoods," Gearon said.

"President Morales has asked our recommendations on issues such

as REDDs [Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation]," said

Alberto Saldamando, legal counsel for the International Indian Treaty

Council.

"REDD is branded as a friendly forest conservation program, yet it is

backed by big polluters," Saldamando said. "REDD is a dangerous

distraction from the root issue of fossil fuel pollution, and could

mean disaster for forest-dependent indigenous peoples the world over."

"We are here from the far north to stand in solidarity with our

brothers and sisters of the South," said Faith Gemmill, executive

director of Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands

(REDOIL), who spoke from the stage at the invitation of President

Morales. "We have a choice as human kind - a path of life, or a path of

destruction. The people who can change the world are here!"