Copenhagen failure 'a real danger': British FM Miliband

(COPENHAGEN) - British Foreign Secretary David Miliband warned on Thursday there was "a real danger" that UN climate talks to be held in Copenhagen at the end of this year would end in failure.

"The Copenhagen deal is hanging in the balance," Miliband told reporters.

"It's a real danger that the world will not come together in the way that is necessary to agree on an ambitious and comprehensive deal in December."

Miliband was in Denmark to meet with four of his European counterparts: Sweden's Carl Bildt, France's Bernard Kouchner, Denmark's Per Stig Moeller, and Finland's Alexander Stubb.

Denmark's Moeller organised the meeting in a bid to speed up negotiations.

All five signed a letter calling for the European Union to "show renewed leadership" on climate change.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told AFP that Copenhagen would be judged as a success if there is the willingness from rich countries to help poorer ones deal with the effects of global warming.

"It is the richest who must share most of the burden with developing countries, Kouchner said.

"Developing countries do not perceive the fight against climate change in the same way as rich countries. They have immediate ambitions that I understand; they want to build something right now and find it egotistical that we impose limits on them," he added.

Poorer countries such as India say over-ambitious targets for cutting greenhouse gases will hamper economic growth and that richer countries should offer greater emissions cuts of their own.

Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen is currently visiting India, the world's third-biggest polluter, in a bid to speed up negotiations.

The December 7-18 talks in Copenhagen, under the 192-nation UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), aim to craft a post-2012 pact for curbing the heat-trapping gases that drive perilous global warming.