Civil servants from 180 nations got down to haggling today over the fine print of a deal to salvage the Kyoto accord which will force most rich nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Exhausted but relieved after four days and a night of talks in Bonn, ministers had left their officials yesterday to thrash out details of the historic compromise, which leaves out the United States.
A number of delegates said there would be robust discussions in committee about the wording of key texts but were confident they would be able to draft the detail within the political compromise agreed by their ministers.
European delegates said they had received assurances from US counterparts that the US delegation was not about to put up resistance to the deal in a plenary meeting of all the nations due later, dampening talk of American blocking tactics.
US officials have made repeated statements that Washington will not get in the way of a Kyoto accord, though they will not ratify it, as long as the pact does not harm their interests.
Under the auspices of the United Nations, the bureaucrats will work until Friday on turning the political agreement into a legal document that should allow the Kyoto Protocol to come into force next year once individual states ratify it.
Tokyo broke the deadlock in Bonn early yesterday when it said it would back a draft agreement over how the treaty born in Japan in 1997 would come into force, despite US President Mr George W. Bush's withdrawal from the pact in March.
Mr Bush endorsed a general commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at a weekend summit in Genoa of the Group of Eight industrial powers but insisted Kyoto was "fatally flawed".
The Kyoto deal was meant to cut industrial countries' greenhouse gas output to 5.2 per cent below 1990 levels by 2012, but environmentalists say compromises in Bonn will mean this target is unlikely to be reached.