Program agreed to tackle climate change

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http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24793989-12377,00.html

THE world's forum for tackling climate change has agreed on a program to culminate in a treaty to tackle the threat from greenhouse gases.

The 192-member UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has set a schedule of work in 2009 designed to conclude with an historic pact in Copenhagen next December.

Taking effect after 2012, the envisioned deal will set down unprecedented measures for curbing emissions of heat-trapping carbon gases and helping poor countries in the firing line of climate change.

UNFCCC members will submit proposals for the treaty's text in the early months of 2009.

By June, these will then be condensed from what is likely to be a huge document into a blueprint for negotiations.

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The final day of the Poznan talks was powerfully spurred by green guru Al Gore, 2007 co-winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and by US Senator John Kerry, acting as pointman for President-elect Barack Obama, who has vowed to root out the heart of George W. Bush's policies on climate change.