UN climate conference ends with expressions of support for Kyoto protocol

As government ministers warned that climate change remains the most important global challenge to humanity, a United Nations climate convention ended its annual meeting today with expressions of support for the Kyoto protocol, renewed pledges of hundreds of millions of dollars to developing countries, and adoption of a host of legal decisions.

The two-week-long ninth session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Milan, Italy, explored a wide range of options for limiting heat-trapping greenhouse gases and adapting to the impact of climate change, according to a news release.

Attended by more than 5,000 participants, including 95 government ministers from the 188 parties to the Convention, the conference sought to stimulate further action by national governments, civil society and the private sector and to prepare for the entry into force of the 1997 Kyoto protocol, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

United States President George W. Bush rejected the Kyoto Protocol in 2001, and published reports this month said Russia had also decided to reject it. Without either US or Russian Federation support the treaty cannot go into effect, and in September UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appealed to the Russian Federation to ratify it.

Three informal ministerial roundtables were held during the conference. Ministers noted that economic growth and climate change policies are compatible and if action is taken at an early stage, economic gains can be made, the release said.

It added that conference participants stressed that Kyoto was as a significant first step towards realizing UNFCCC's goal of stabilizing atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases at safe levels, and called for its immediate entry into force.

Some two dozen legal decisions adopted will strengthen the institutional framework of both the Convention and the Kyoto protocol, the release said.

The European Union, Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland renewed earlier pledges to contribute $410 annually to developing countries through the Special Climate Change Fund and the Least Developed Countries Fund, which will support technology transfer, adaptation projects and other activities.