CLIMATE CHANGE:The 190-nation climate summit in Bali yesterday began a hunt for a new global deal to fight global warming by 2009 with skirmishing about how far China and India should curb surging greenhouse gas emissions. The meeting, which runs until December 14th, will involve 10,000 participants who will try to launch talks on a climate pact to succeed the UN's Kyoto protocol.
After an opening day dominated by ceremony, governments set up a "special group" to look at options for launching two years of talks meant to bind the US and developing nations led by China and India more firmly into fighting climate change.The group of senior officials will report back to 130 environment ministers, who will arrive at the weekend for the talks at the luxury Indonesian beach resort.
The meeting also agreed to study ways to do more to transfer clean technologies, such as solar panels or wind turbines, to developing nations. Such a move is a key to greater involvement by developing nations in a new pact beyond Kyoto.
The Kyoto protocol now binds 36 rich nations to curb emissions of greenhouse gases, mainly from burning fossil fuels, by 5 per cent below 1990 levels by 2008-12 in a step to curb droughts, floods, heatwaves and rising seas. The Bali talks seek a mandate to widen Kyoto to all nations beyond 2012.