The G8 and climate change -- a little progress

The TimesOnline describes it as inching forward, and that sounds about right.

A joint statement issued this morning by the heads of the world's leading industrialised nations, who are meeting in Japan, agreed to work towards a global target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50 per cent by the year 2050.

But

European leaders, including Gordon Brown, had been pushing for much more ambitious interim cuts to be implemented by 2020. These were blocked by the United States, Japan and Canada.

Even Japanese organisers of the summit admitted that the statement represented only minor progress on the road to a new agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which began at the UN conference in Bali last December.

A statement from the WWF says that the "WWF finds it pathetic that they still duck their historic responsibility."