Six members of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Alliance stripped off outside the cabinet office here, chanting "Save our environment!" and "Protect the earth!" along with about a dozen fellow protesters.

"At first I was a little bit embarassed, but then when I thought of sacrifice for the environment, it was worthwhile," one protestor told reporters.

Taiwan is not a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol, which is aimed at slowing global warming and is due to come into effect on Wednesday, as it is not a United Nations member. However it has pledged to abide by the treaty's terms.

But the demonstrators alleged that the government's economic policies do not take enough account of the environment.

They referred to the cabinet's approval last month of two investment projects, the construction of a steel mill and a naphtha cracking complex in western Taiwan for a combined cost of around 580 billion Taiwan dollarsbillion US).

They said that the amount of carbon dioxide emission from the two projects is estimated to account for one-fifth of the total amount of carbon dioxide produced by the island's industries.

The Kyoto Protocol seeks for the industrial world as a whole to slash its greenhouse gas emission by 5.2 percent by 2012, with targets set according to each country's pollution level.

A total of 141 countries have signed the treaty including 30 industrialized countries but not the United States or Australia.

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