UN climate talks near finish line with no finance deal

Negotiators from nearly 200 countries entered the penultimate day of UN climate talks in Doha on Thursday divided on near-term finance for poor nations' global warming mitigation plans. The issue is key to the adoption of a package of plans by Friday for limiting climate-altering greenhouse gas emissions, as scientists warn that the world is headed for calamitous warming levels. On Tuesday, the European Union and United States refused to commit to concrete, new climate funding for the 2013-2020 period, as poor nations and those most at risk from global warming insisted on seeing new numbers. Pledges from individual countries did begin to trickle in, but the EU said tight finances prevented it taking on binding near-term commitments as a bloc, while Washington insisted it was already "doing what we agreed to do." The talks in the Qatari capital are meant to extend the life of the Kyoto Protocol, the world's only binding pact on curbing Earth-warming greenhouse gas emissions, whose first leg expires on December 31. The Kyoto deal binds developed nations to emissions curbs, excluding major developing polluters such as China and India -- as well as the US which refused to ratify it. In Doha, developed nations are also being asked to show how they intend to keep a promise to raise climate funding for poor countries to $100 billion per year by 2020 -- up from a total of $30 billion in 2010-2012. Developing countries say they need at least another $60 billion (46 billion euros) between now and 2015 to deal with climate change-induced droughts, floods, rising seas and storms, and demanded to see new numbers. But the EU negotiator Pete Betts said on Wednesday: "These are tough financial times in Europe... (and) we, as other developed countries, are not going to be in a position at this meeting to agree any kind of target for 2015." The EU has since reiterated that there are long-standing post-2012 funding commitments on the table, amounting to some 6.85 billion euros, and several individual member states are expected to join Germany and Britain in making fresh pledges in Doha. The United States' Jonathan Pershing, however, insisted Washington was "doing what we agreed to do and what we've committed to do" -- and this did not include pre-2020 funding. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged negotiators on Tuesday to put aside their differences in tackling the mounting global warming "crisis." On Wednesday, negotiators nominated a minister from the Maldives and one from Switzerland -- representing both the rich and poor side of the finance divide -- to try to mediate a compromise. Agreement on financing and a follow-up period for Kyoto should smooth the way to a new, universal climate pact that must be drafted by 2015 and come into effect by 2020.