Talks on climate change collapse in acrimony

The world may have lost its “best chance” to combat global warming effectively after 180 countries failed to agree terms in The Hague last weekend, environmentalists have said.

Negotiations to agree concrete measures to implement the 1997 Kyoto protocol collapsed on Saturday after delegations representing the European Union and the United States failed to agree measures to curb the greenhouses gases heating the planet. An eleventh hour compromise, brokered by the United Kingdom's deputy prime minister, John Prescott, and involving significant US concessions, was rejected by Germany, France, Denmark, and Sweden.

As a result, climate talks remain in limbo until October 2001, when high level negotiations are due …