UN Global Warming Conference In Poland Overshadowed By Economic Concerns

December 1, 2008 11:00 a.m. EST

Poznan, Poland (AHN) - The global economic crisis and rising greenhouse gas emissions in developed and emerging nations is overshadowing the UN global warming climate conference which opens Monday in Poznan, Poland.

The two-week climate change summit is an attempt by governments to come up with a new international agreement to save the environment. The output, which will succeed the Kyoto Protocol, is expected to be inked in Denmark in 2009.

Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, said, quoted by Deutsche Welle, "The need for real progress on tackling climate change has never been more urgent... The effects of climate change that science has identified are already weighing upon those most vulnerable."

Among the key points expected to be tackled in the forum is how developing countries could hasten financing and technological assistance to poorer nations to help them reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.

De Boer admitted the Poznan conference is looming under the larger shadow of the global financial recession and recession which had hit many nations. "But we cannot allow this to detract from the fight against climate change... The effects of climate change... are already weighing heavily upon those most vulnerable," he told BBC.