France abandons Sarkozy's carbon tax...

France backed down Tuesday from a plan to tax carbon dioxide emissions that had been a central plank of President Nicolas Sarkozy's push for a more prominent role in the global fight against climate change.

The plan, launched by Sarkozy with much fanfare last September, has been on the back burner since being ruled unconstitutional in December. Sarkozy's government had insisted a reworked tax would nonetheless go into force by July.

Leading conservative legislator Jean-Francois Cope said after meeting the prime minister that they agreed that any carbon tax "would be Europe-wide or not (exist) at all," instead of being a French-only tax. More...

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