Mixed-Bag Climate Conference Draws to a Close in Bonn

U.N. climate negotiations were drawing to a close in Bonn on Friday with delegates reporting progress despite Russia blocking a key working group.

With just over two years remaining before the deadline for a new, universal climate pact, the talks in the former German capital sought to lay important groundwork for the next ministerial-level huddle in Warsaw, Poland, in November.

Delegates pointed to a positive spirit in work to examine the vague outlines of the new deal, which would for the first time bind all the world's nations to measurable targets for curbing Earth-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

But a Russian procedural objection paralyzed one of three working groups amid accusations it was putting narrow politics before the urgent need to halt the march of global warming.

The new global must be signed in 2015 and enter into force five years later.

Drafting the pact is the work of one of three subsidiary bodies of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), meeting in Bonn since June 3.

The body, dubbed the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform (ADP), finished its work for this session on Thursday.

But a second group, the Subsidiary body for Implementation (SBI), never got out of the starting blocks.

Moscow insisted that a discussion on procedure be added to the SBI's agenda for Bonn.

Russia was backed by Ukraine and Belarus but other parties disagreed, and the SBI finally threw in the towel on Tuesday after more than a week of haggling, without doing any work.

Europe on Thursday mooted a diplomatic push to persuade Russia to stop its blockade of the SBI in time for the Warsaw meet.

The SBI and the UNFCCC's third working group, the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice, are to hold their closing plenary meetings on Friday.

The new, global agreement will seek to meet a U.N. goal of limiting global warming to a maximum 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 deg Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels.

U.N. climate chief Christiana Figueres announced on Friday that Peru will host the 2014 ministerial-level talks.