Climate talks head into second week

Agence France-Press reports that, "If all goes well, the (climate) conference (in Copenhagen) will agree on an outline deal of national pledges to curb carbon emissions and set up a mechanism to provide billions of dollars in help for poor countries..."

The New York Times adds that, "The United Nations has said that a fund for such a purpose should amount to about $30 billion over the next three years..."

"Poor nations want pledges more on the order of $100 billion annually by the end of the next decade, and they signaled last week that short-term pledges just would not do."

"The European Union came up with a pledge at the end of the week of $10.5 billion over the next three years."

"The administration of President Barack Obama, for its part, has asked Congress for $1.2 billion to go toward such a purpose, but Congress has not taken any action on the request..."

CHINA
Agence France-Presse notes, "In the first such concession of its kind, major player China, the world's biggest polluter, said it had given up its demand for developed countries to fund efforts to fight climate change."

TALKS NEXT YEAR
"More talks would be needed next year to agree on vital technical details, themselves a political minefield."

UPCOMING MEETINGS
The first scheduled UN climate meeting after Copenhagen will take place in Bonn, Germany on May 31 to June 11. This is an annual meeting normally focused on technical issues, but for the last two meetings has been used to negotiate the climate deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol.

The next Conference of Parties (COP) like the one now underway in Copenhagen then takes place on November 8 to November 19 in Mexico City.

The Kyoto Protocol itself expires on December 31, 2012.

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