Climatologist Claims Denier Defamed Him

VANCOUVER, B.C. (CN) - Andrew Weaver, a leading climate change researcher at the University of Victoria, claims climate-change denier Tim Ball defamed him in an article that accused Weaver of falsifying data while he was on the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Weaver says Ball wrote the article, "Corruption of Climate Science Has Created 30 Lost Years," published on the Internet by the Canada Free Press, a conservative website that touts itself as a news source "espousing conservative viewpoints, cornerstone of which contain love of God, love of family, love of country."

Weaver claims the article falsely accused him of cheating taxpayers by using research grant money to publish junk science about climate change.

Ball also falsely claimed that in a face-to-face meeting Weaver was paranoid and fearful of being exposed as incompetent and unfit to hold his position as the Canada research chair in climate modeling and analysis at the University of Victoria's school of Earth and Ocean Sciences, according to the complaint.

The article title still shows up in online searches, but it appears to have been taken down. An apology to Weaver dated Jan. 20, 2011 also shows up in online search results, but appears to have been removed as well.

Weaver sued Canada's National Post newspaper for libel in April 2010 after it published articles accusing him of cherry-picking scientific data to support his research.

Weaver is represented in B.C. Supreme Court by Roger D. McConchie.

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