No sooner did the Canadian delegation return from a landmark global warming summit in Durban, South Africa, this week than its leaders promptly informed the U.N. climate regime that they officially wanted out of the Kyoto Protocol.

Declaring the 1997 treaty an "impediment" to fighting global warming, Canadian Environment Minister Peter Kent said the country cannot operate under a regime where other major emitters like the United States are not bound to also cut carbon.

"Domestically, we will do our part to reduce greenhouse gas emissions," Kent said at a press conference at the House of Commons. But, he added, Canada "cannot do it alone."

Part of the global critique of Canada's pioneering pullout from the Kyoto Protocol came from young video animators in Taiwan, who saw oil companies pouring money on an unidentified politician. Photo courtesy of Next Media Animation.

By formally pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol, Canada avoids paying some $14 billion in penalties that it would otherwise face for failing to meet its 2012 greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets. Yet what the country saves in money it appears to be losing in international goodwill as environmental leaders worldwide condemn and even ridicule it as an environmental scofflaw.

"I regret that Canada has announced it will withdraw, and I am surprised over its timing," U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres said in one frosty statement.

She noted that the Durban conference not only ended with the European Union and others pledging targets to a second phase of Kyoto, but also laid the foundation for a broader agreement of the kind Canada purports to want that includes all emitters.

A 'legal obligation' remains

"Whether or not Canada is a Party to the Kyoto Protocol, it has a legal obligation under the Convention to reduce its emissions, and a moral obligation to itself and future generations to lead in the global effort," Figueres said. "Industrialized countries whose emissions have risen significantly since 1990, as is the case for Canada, remain in a weaker position to call on developing countries to limit their emissions."

Graham Saul, director of Climate Action Network Canada, called the decision a "national disgrace" and said Prime Minister Stephen Harper "just spat in the faces of people around the world for whom climate change is increasingly a life and death issue." Sierra Club Canada said the decision means the government is "sentencing our children to catastrophic climate change."

Not to be outdone, a group of animators in Taiwan produced a blistering animated cartoon featuring a Canadian politician shredding the Kyoto Protocol, making an obscene gesture to the U.N. secretary-general and partying with oil company executives. After enjoying a cash shower served by oil giants from barrels, the politician spits in the faces of climate refugees, then leaves them to drown in the rising seas.

The one-minute Next Media Animation film provoked a debate on YouTube, where supporters spread the humor, inventing new jokes like rewarding Harper with the "Fossil of the Year" Award.

Several conservative organizations that either deny or cast doubt on climate science and oppose international action to address emissions came to Canada's defense. The Heartland Institute issued a statement calling Canada "wise to join the growing number of nations acknowledging that the Kyoto Protocol was a failure."

'Biggest news of the day' in Taiwan

Richard Hazeldine, an NMA editor who co-produced the animation with a team mainly made up of young Taiwanese, said they welcome debates. While not everyone inside his team is an environmentalist, Hazeldine said, Canada's departure from Kyoto fell into the category of the biggest news of the day -- the material his studio uses for its daily work. And, he added, "there were lots of gags to be made."

Click here to see Taiwan's (unofficial) reaction. Video courtesy of Next Media Animation.

For instance, the animation replaced Canada's car drivers with hockey players, since Kent publicly said that his nation could cut as much greenhouse gas emissions as the Kyoto Protocol required only by adopting extreme measures like pulling all motor vehicles from its roads.

According to its commitment to the Kyoto Protocol, Canada should reduce its emissions 6 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. But its emissions in 2009 were 17 percent above 1990 levels.

Jake Schmidt, international policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said that Canada's withdrawal will hurt it its ability to forge other international agreements.

"It's going to impact the relationship with other countries. Countries in Africa, I would wager, would not have the same relationship with Canada after this," he said. "The trust factor is not there."