Obama raises prospect of Copenhagen II

The latest round of negotiations to agree a successor to the Kyoto Treaty kicked off in Bangkok today amidst reports that US President Barack Obama attempted to downplay the importance of the forthcoming Copenhagen Summit at last week's meeting of the G20 in Pittsburgh.

According to reports, Obama told world leaders that, while the Copenhagen meeting where an international deal is expected to be finalised remains important to the fight against climate change, it does not necessarily represent the "make or break" conference it has been widely billed as.

Speaking following the meeting, Canada's prime minister Stephen Harper offered his support for Obama's suggestion that international climate change negotiations could continue into next year.

"I would cite what President Obama said to us at our meetings and that is that while Copenhagen is a very important meeting we should not view it as a make or break on climate change," he said. " It will be a step, an ongoing step, in an important world process to deal with this critical issue."

A number of observers have already predicted that the slow progress of the Copenhagen talks means that a second summit may yet be required next year to finalise a deal, but Obama's comments represent the clearest indication yet that such a delay could secure powerful backing.

The president's comments are also likely to fuel rumours that a rift is developing between the US and the EU over the nature of the Copenhagen deal. According to recent reports, EU and US negotiators are locked in a stand off after the US proposed an almost complete reworking of the Kyoto legislative framework on which much of the Copenhagen Treaty is likely to be built.

Speaking at the opening of the latest round of talks in Bangkok today, the UN's top climate change official Yvo De Boer insisted that the negotiations remained on track to deliver a deal in Copenhagen this year.

"Time is not just pressing, it has almost run out," he said. "As many leaders have said: There is no plan B. And if we do not realise plan A, the future will hold us to account for it. Some say this clock is ticking down to nothing, but you know this is not true."

Green groups also expressed frustration at the prospect of further delays to the Copenhagen process.

"The great concern is that Obama's comments will act as cover for a lowering of ambition that allows nations to treat Copenhagen like abstract trade negotiations that can be delyed again and again," warned Asad Rehman, international climate campaigner at Friends of the Earth. "It might be true that there is still a lot of distance between the negotiating positions, but saying that this meeting is not as urgent as people think sends out a terrible message to the negotiators."

His comments were echoed by Craig Bennett of the Corporate Leaders Group on Climate Change, which last week issued a Copenhagen Communiqué backed by over 500 businesses calling for a robust deal to be agreed this year.

"A lot of people would accept that the current proposals are not perfect, but we cannot make the best the enemy of the good and wipe the slate clean at this stage of the negotiations and start again," he said. "Businesses are watching Copenhagen very carefully and they want to see a demonstration of political will that allows them to unlock billions of dollars of investment in clean technology. If the deal is delayed, they might decide to delay that investment too."