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Major powers back UN climate deal; Bolivia opposed

Other News Materials 11 December 2010 10:53 (UTC +04:00)

Government ministers lined up behind a compromise package of new proposals to confront climate change at a UN summit in Mexico, yet the lone opposition of Bolivia still threatened to block a deal as the debate moved into Saturday morning, DPA reported.

Major powers including the United States, China, India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Brazil and the European Union spoke in support of a draft deal issued Friday that resolved major stumbling blocks that had dogged negotiators at the Cancun summit for the past two weeks.

"What we have now is a text that, while not perfect, is certainly a good basis for moving forward," said US climate envoy Todd Stern.

The deal included compromise language on major divides like the future of the Kyoto Protocol and created a Green Climate Fund for poor countries. But it also pushed major questions on issues like the legal form of any future climate treaty to another summit.

Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa, who chaired the talks, won praise for her handling of the summit and received numerous ovations from ministers during a plenary session that went into the morning.

"You have restored the confidence of the world community in multilateralism and the multilateral process, at a time when confidence in this process had hit a historic low," said Indian Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh.

But Bolivia still had the power to block an agreement, which required the support of all 194 countries attending the summit. Bolivia was likely to face enormous pressure to change its position in the waning hours of the conference.

Pablo Solon, the head of Bolivia's delegation, said the draft compromise didn't go far enough in curbing global warming and was too controlled by the United States, but he stopped short of saying whether Bolivia would outright veto a final deal.

The draft sought to strike a fine balance between wealthy and developing countries over how to tackle greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming.

"We believe the outcome has fairly reflected the wills of the different parties," China's envoy Xie Zhenhua told the plenary.

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