The U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change was adopted in 1992, at the Earth Summit, in Rio de Janeiro and entered into force in 1994. The Kyoto Protocol was agreed in 1997, at the third annual meeting (COP 3) and sets out the main targets and methods for reducing greenhouse gases. COP 4, in 1998 put forward the Buenos Aires Plan of Action, which was supposed to be finalised at COP6 and should provide the basic guidelines for the future.

The 5% target agreed to in the Kyoto Protocol could be averaged among the nations signing the Convention and ranges from a -8% cut for the European Union to a +10 % increase for Iceland.

The E.U. target may be shared among the 15 member states of the Union and all Parties to the Convention may balance their targets through emissions trading.

COP6 + in Bonn radically altered these targets and a final Agreement was expected during COP7 in Marrakech, Morocco, this past November.

Environmentalists argue that the Kyoto Protocol is already weak and some Russian delegates believe that it has little to do with the environment, but is instead an economic development program.

Economic development is a key issue in all climate change

discussions, since it is largely industrialisation which has caused the problem.

Many of the most heavily industrialised nations, and thus the largest pollutors, are wary of any measures which will compromise their economic independence, while some developing nations see the entire process as a means of preserving the status quo and restricting their development. As a result, discussions on the actual climate often take second place to economic issues.

Much of the debate focuses on emissions trading and the inclusion of "carbon sinks" in the Clean Development Mechanism of the Kyoto Protocol.