Polar Bears may appear on ‘Endangered’ list

Under legal pressure from three environmental groups, President George W Bush's administration will propose listing polar bears as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Because of warming temperatures in its habitat one of the world's most recognizable animals could be driven out of existence.

To discuss the status of the animals, a news conference was scheduled by an Interior Department official on Wednesday. "We've reviewed all the available data that leads us to believe the sea ice the polar bear depends on has been receding," said the official. "Obviously, the sea ice is melting because the temperatures are warmer."

The Bush administration has time and again cast off scientific thesis that global warming is resulting due to human activity and has resisted capping greenhouse gas emissions as bad for business and US workers.

Green house gases are produced by the burning of fossil fuels and they trap heat in the atmosphere, because of which the polar ice caps are melting. This is known as the green house effect. The rising temperatures could raise sea levels and cause more droughts, floods and heat waves.

A population of Polar bears lives in Alaska and spends part of the year in Canada and Russia. The other countries with polar bears in their Arctic regions are Denmark and Norway. These animals cannot survive in high temperatures.

Some significant uncertainty still remains about what could happen to bear populations in the future and so the official said the decision to propose polar bears as threatened with extinction wasn’t easy.

The post reported that by submitting the proposal Wednesday, the government would be meeting a deadline under a legal settlement with environmental advocacy groups that argue the government has failed to respond rapidly enough to the polar bear's quandary.

"It's such a loud recognition that global warming is real," said Andrew Wetzler, One of the lawyers who filed suit against the administration. "It is rapidly threatening the polar bear and, in fact, an entire ecosystem with utter destruction."