EPA Chief Says He Was Sabotaged in Rio : Earth Summit: Reilly blames the White House for undermining its delegation at the U.N. conference in June.

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency has criticized the Bush Administration’s handling of the recent Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, saying it was like taking a bungee jump while somebody cut his line.

William K. Reilly, EPA administrator and head of the U.S. delegation at the U.N. Conference on Environment and Development, made the comments in a memorandum to EPA employees.

He acknowledged a message of support signed by 3,000 of them and said: “Not having had a lot of positive reinforcement in Rio, it was all the more welcome to come home to some.”

In the memo, Reilly recalled an episode during the summit in June in which the White House undermined his efforts by leaking one of his private messages from Rio.

“For me personally, it was like a bungee jump,” Reilly wrote July 15. “You dive into space secured by a line on your leg. . . . It doesn’t typically occur to you that someone might cut your line!”

The leaked message he referred to had described a compromise that might have overcome U.S. objections to the so-called biodiversity treaty to protect threatened plant and animal species. The U.S. refusal to sign the treaty contributed to the image of the United States as the summit’s spoiler, Reilly said.

“The U.S. early on supported the need for a biodiversity convention, so it was a perverse twist that we alone rejected it.

“The United States’ decision was the subject of intense controversy and criticism,” the memo said. “In public relations terms, we never recovered from it.”

A spokesman said the White House would have no comment on the memo.

Reilly predicted that the United States would reverse course and sign the biodiversity treaty. He said U.S. opposition was based on what might have been a misunderstanding between the White House and the biotechnology industry.

Democratic vice presidential nominee Al Gore, campaigning in Kentucky, said the memo from Reilly was evidence of what he has been saying for weeks--that President Bush has only paid lip service to environmental issues.

The Tennessee senator, who led an alternate delegation to the summit, said: “I share Bill Reilly’s deep sense of disappointment. . . . Bush and (Vice President Dan) Quayle undermined Bill Reilly, America and the American people who care deeply about leaving for their children a clean and safe environment. An historic opportunity to make real progress confronting urgent environmental problems was undermined by a dismal lack of leadership.”

In the memo, Reilly pointed to some of the summit’s achievements, including a non-binding agreement that outlines environmental action plans for the decade.

“Just as in the field of human rights, these declarations will have the force of new expectations and will be a big stick with which to beat recalcitrant governments,” Reilly said.