Talks on global warming agreed

A UN conference on global warming has ended with a watershed agreement by more than 150 nations - the US not among them - to open talks on mandatory post-2012 reductions in greenhouse gases.

The Bush administration, which rejects the emissions cutbacks of the current Kyoto Protocol, accepted a second, weaker conference decision, agreeing on Saturday to join an exploratory global “dialogue” on future steps to combat climate change.

That agreement specifically ruled out “negotiations leading to new commitments”.

The divergent tracks did little to close the climate gap between Washington and the Kyoto supporters, which include Europe and Japan.

But environmentalists welcomed the plan to negotiate “second-phase” emissions cuts.

“The Kyoto Protocol is alive and kicking,” said Jennifer Morgan of the World Wide Fund for Nature.

Before finally ending the two-week conference in snowy Montreal, conference president Stephane Dion told delegates: “What we have achieved is no less than a map for the future, the Montreal Action Plan.”

But Mr Dion, Canada’s environment minister, later admitted: “I would prefer to have the US in Kyoto.”

The US is the world’s biggest greenhouse-gas emitter, but President George W Bush rejected Kyoto outright after taking office in 2001.