Obama Urges World to Unite Behind Climate Pact as Talks Falter

U.S. President Barack Obama joined world leaders from over 100 countries for the final sessions of the U.N. Climate Change conference in Copenhagen. As negotiations drew to a close, no new compromise proposals were evident and talk turned to forging a political commitment with details of measures to be taken left for future negotiations.


U.S. President Barack Obama speaks at the morning plenary session of the United Nations Climate Change Conference at the Bella Center in Copenhagen, Denmark, 18 Dec 2009


Addressing the gathering of world leaders President Obama urged them to put aside differences and agree on a plan of action.

"After months of talk, after two weeks of negotiations, after innumerable side meetings, bilateral meetings, endless hours of discussion among negotiators, I believe that the pieces of that accord should now be clear," he said.

The United States has spelled out its proposals for a plan to include decisive national action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, transparent standards to verify compliance and funding to help the most affected and poor countries adapt.

Mr. Obama offered no new proposals beyond those already on the table, including a U.S. commitment to reduce emissions by 17 percent by 2020 and by more than 80 percent by 2050 and a commitment to work with others to mobilize a global fund of $100 billion a year by 2020 to help developing countries.

President Obama acknowledged the plan will not please everyone, but would be a move in the right direction.

"We can embrace this accord, take a substantial step forward, continue to refine it and build upon its foundation," he said.

There was no immediate indication of further compromises, including from China on allowing outside monitoring of its emission curbs. The issue has put it at odds with the United States at this conference.

As they stepped to the podium, many other world leaders focused on steps their governments had already taken to combat climate change and stressed their commitment to continuing those efforts.

Some expressed disappointment that not more had been achieved. Among them Lesotho's Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisilli, who spoke on behalf of the least developed nations.

"To say that we are disappointed is indeed an understatement, in particular that after 24 months of hard negotiations and the intensive deliberations of this conference, an agreement could not be reached on a legally binding regime," he said.

After the initial session, opportunities for further discussions remained through the afternoon.

There was widespread doubt all along that this conference would be able to fulfill the hopes of those who wanted a global, binding agreement to succeed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. There's been increasing talk of a political framework agreement here and tacit acknowledgment that further negotiations will be necessary to get beyond that.