Thin climate accord a small step in long process

"This particular text falls far short of our expectations," the European Commission president, Jose Manuel Barroso, said of the political declaration produced in talks Friday between President Barack Obama and big developing countries at the U.N. climate conference. Others were harsher in their criticism.

Ill-starred though it seemed at its birth, the 11th-hour deal may ultimately be seen as another halting step in the slow, painful evolution of the global fight against climate change — the two-decade-old effort to negotiate coordinated cuts internationally in carbon dioxide and other industrial, transport and agricultural emissions blamed for global warming.

The conflicts of many interests have marked those talks from the beginning: the division between rich and poor nations, the rivalry between the U.S. and Europe, the developing world's cleavage between poor and middle-class countries, the interests of the oil states, the concerns of island states endangered by global warming's rising seas.

All those interests and more played out in the two-week U.N. meeting, which ended with an unprecedentedly large working summit on climate, involving more than 110 presidents and premiers. The spotlight fell mainly on two of them, leaders of the two biggest polluters, China's Premier Wen Jiabao and America's Obama.

In two meetings on Friday, the pair seem to have worked through chronic mistrust between their countries, reached agreement on a summit declaration and brought other big developing states (Brazil, India and South Africa) into the deal. Sponsors later claimed much broader support among the 193 conference nations.

A final session of climate conference delegates that lasted through the night cast doubt, however, as several countries, including Bolivia, Venezuela and Sudan said the document is unacceptable because it lacks targets for reducing carbon emissions.

The declaration touched on major elements of the climate story, sometimes with scant detail, always with no legal obligation attached:

• Nations agreed to cooperate in reducing emissions, "with a view" to scientists' warnings to keep temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees F) above preindustrial levels, that is, 1.3 degrees C (2.3 degrees F) above today's average temperatures.

• Developing nations will report every two years on their voluntary actions to reduce emissions. Those reports would be subject to "international consultations and analysis" — a concession by China to the U.S.