By BOB LEWIS

Associated Press

WILLIAMSBURG, Va. -- As Congress grapples with legislation on carbon emissions to counter global warming -- a looming problem that threatens global security -- Southern governors fear their region's abundant coal, oil and natural gas supplies will be forsaken in the quest for new sources of energy.

A Southern Governors Association panel heard Saturday that global warming, left unchecked, threatens peace worldwide and the safety, security and economies of their states.

Former Sen. John W. Warner of Virginia and retired Air Force Gen. Rich Engel, director of the National Intelligence Council's Climate Change and State Stability Program, presented studies showing that global competition for scarce resources and devastating new climate shifts ranging from droughts to melting polar ice caps will foster conflict, instability and terrorism.

Somalia's genocide and chaos illustrate how climate disasters create a far-reaching menace, Warner said. Somalia today serves as a base and hideout for pirates who hijack global shipping in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean.

"It was in the grips of a strong, prolonged drought, and they simply did not have the food and the resources for that government to provide for the wants of the people, so that spread into conflict and soon that whole government collapsed and terrorists were fighting to take over," said Warner, who retired earlier this year after 30 years in the Senate.

That puts pressure on America's military, particularly in troubled regions such as the Middle East that generate the bulk of the world's petroleum, Warner told about a dozen governors attending a conference in Virginia's colonial capital.